Hampton Estate Naturally Reared Produce Newsletter November 2016

November is blowing in hard, pumpkins and fireworks are well out of the way and all our thoughts turn to heartwarming beef stews, delicious beef casseroles, deeply satisfying beef pot roasts and wonderfully aromatic beef roasting joints.

And I’m delighted to report that pedigree Hampton Naturally Reared 28 day hung, local beef is in good supply for our next beef day on FRIDAY 2nd DECEMBER.

Minced beef, stewing steak, diced steak, skirt and shin all make fantastic stews, casseroles, lasagnes and pies, whilst brisket and short ribs cooked long and slow are jam packed full of flavour and melt in the mouth. Joints of Silverside, Top Rump and Topside can be pot roasted with a stack of root vegetables and a drop of red, or roasted traditionally in a hot oven, and steaks should be generously cut, either sirloin or rump and a hot oven or roaring winter barbeque will do them justice. What a choice!

Our 10 kg family beef bags and our 4kg smaller version are both available for ordering or simply make your order up of whatever you need and in any quantity  and send it over. Don’t forget to add some Hampton Herby sausages and a packet of Hampton Beef Bangers and you will be well stocked especially as all Hampton beef is packed fresh, labelled clearly and ready for your freezer if you have to wait. Just a thought as our next beef day will be at the end of January 2017, a full 7 weeks away.

‘No pies, no pies’ is the call from the kitchen and Im afraid that we have no meat at all to turn into our Hampton Special Beef Pies. Instead the good people of Puttenham enjoyed our 100% Beefburgers  at the Puttenham Bonfire and Fireworks at the weekend, where we supplied 550 beef burgers and 750 Hampton Herby sausages, and our cupboards are bare for pie production. But what a fantastic firework event and a mega bonfire, voted the best ever by all on the farm.

Friday 2nd December will be a very popular day as we welcome old friends back to Hampton. Paul Young of Imbibros will be showing his 2016 winter collection of fine wines and there will be a good variety to taste and buy. Paul also delivers all around our area on a weekly basis which makes ordering extremely easy and his knowledge of wine is always very impressive. He is sure to have some winners for us to taste.

Charlie Gardner of The Cold Pressed Oil Co at Crondall will be back with his delicious oils and also his 2016 hampers. I particularly like the sound of his White Truffle Hamper which contains oils and sauces and all his goods will be on sale on the 2nd. And thinking of that early present, Andrea Pinnington of The Fine Feather Press will be wowing us with her latest bird and bird song books and there will be lots of opportunity to look at all the other wonderful publications, wall charts, and posters which make us sound so knowledgeable when it comes to our local feathered friends and the natural environment.

Thinking of presents the annual Myrtles Courtyard Christmas Fair is being held the week before our beef day on Friday 25th November. There will be a wide array of stalls, both inside and out, coffee and mince pies on arrival, Bridget will be manning the catering stand and Hampton beef will be on the menu for lunch. It all starts at 10.00am and a local girls choir will be performing at 11.00am. Raffle to be drawn at 1pm and finishing time is 2pm. Entrance is just £4 and all proceeds to The United Parish funds.

Out in the fields cows and calves are about to be weaned, which makes for a noisy time as the calves suddenly realise that there is no milk on tap, and cows suddenly realise that they are free to wander without being a regular milk bar. We are also about to pregnancy diagnose all the cows to ensure that our fine bull Regent has performed over the summer and is about to be the proud father of 40! The cows are now in their winter fields and will be enjoying a diet of straw and lucerne plus the chance to savour the last shoots of grass before it stops growing over the winter.

From winter to summer and thinking back to June we were on the hunt for a new Assistant Estate Manager and having advertised the post were inundated with interest. Bridget and I are delighted to report that we have appointed Will Godwin to the team here at Hampton and he will be very much in evidence on 2nd December, serving coffee and cake, putting bags into customer’s cars and I know he is looking forward to meeting all those who are with us that day. Come and say hello.

Please come and see us on 2nd December, and if possible put your order in now to avoid disappointment. We hate it when customers can’t have exactly what they would like. Do remember that our next beef day is at the end of January (after the diet) and that you might need supplies to last you until then, and if you can come to The Christmas Fair at Myrtles Courtyard on 25th November you will be very welcome.

Very best wishes from us all.

Bill and Bridget

Hampton Estate Naturally Reared Produce Newsletter October 2016

On FRIDAY 28th OCTOBER our doors will be open, our coffee brewed, cakes made and beef ready for picking up here at Hampton. Come over from 10.30am and tell us your autumnal news, try a Hampton Herby sausage taster and debate venison recipes. It’s all too tantalising, but please, please order in advance if you possibly can as we would much rather you left with what you really wanted rather than what was left.

Our beef sides are in our butcher’s cold room gently maturating and after four weeks of hanging the taste will be pure Hampton beef. Delicious. We have 10kg family bags ready to order or 4kg helpful bags, both of which have a variety of cuts, steaks and joints. Alternatively make up your own order and tell us what you need, for instance a kilo of steak, a roasting joint to feed six, two kilos of mince and a bone for the dog (always free).Then add in some sausages, either Hampton Herbies or our own Beef Bangers, and how about a pack of beef burgers made with 100% prime Hampton beef?

Venison supplies are looking good. We are seeing our wild roe deer throughout the estate and we have haunches, steaks, diced and minced venison ready to be ordered. It is wonderful, tasty meat that hardly requires cooking and there are a myriad of great venison recipes out there just waiting to be tried.

Hampton Herbies and Hampton Beef Bangers come in packs of six and are always popular and we always have the most delicious offal for those offal aficionados including live, heart and tongue. Go on, try some!

Our hop harvest took a little longer than usual and we bade farewell to our student hop pickers who all returned to academic rather than manual labours after an excellent tour of the Hogs Back Brewery. Hop yield was good and quality seemed pretty high, both in our own hops and the Hogs Back Brewery hops which we picked after ours as they have different later maturing varieties. Everyone enjoyed a bit of the limelight with our appearance on Countryfile and as always it’s amazing how many people get their fix of the British countryside on a Sunday evening. Here’s a link to the Hampton highlight https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_giUtc1g38 and for us it’s a wonderful momento of Hampton hop picking 2016.

This summer we have been concentrating again on the Hampton woodlands which comprise the most lovely mixtures of trees from mature softwood plantations to centuries old oak and beech. Much of the woodland is accessible by foot for everyone to enjoy and the carparks we have added over the years make Lower Puttenham Common, Britty Wood and Binton Wood good walking spots. We are clear felling larch in Coach Bottom at the moment and also line thinning the Corsican Pine plantations which we planted straight after the 1987 gales to give them air and light and combat needle blight. The timber is taken to the mills in Norfolk where it is turned into fencing materials such as larch lap panels and fence stakes. Woodland management is a long term process and we will be back again to second thin these plantations in about 20 years’ time!

Don’t forget that another part of our woodland enterprise revolves around supplying dry, well-seasoned high quality logs for your fire or woodburner. We deliver a pick up load (approximately 400 logs) to your door and the price at the moment is still £110. Why not order with your beef?

Good news, you will be able to enjoy Hampton 100% Beef burgers at the Famous Puttenham Bonfire on 5th November in the village, or a Hampton Herby sausage in a bun. And talking of upcoming events Halloween will also feature on the farm this year as the pumpkin field at Binton Farm is in full production and is a real landmark from the North Downs Way. I think that they are all destined for the carving market!

Advance notice for our final beef day of the year will be on Friday 2nd December.

Please put your order in for 28th October to avoid disappointment, and Kate and Bridget will always give help and advice with recipes or queries if needed. Just ring the Hampton Meat Helpline 01483 810465 or email: sales@hamptonestate.co.uk

Best wishes

Bill and Bridget

Hampton Estate Naturally Reared Produce Newsletter September 2016

September on the farm at Hampton is synonymous with hops and everyone is concentrating on the hop harvest at Puttenham. The aroma of our Fuggles hops is filling the air as they dry in the kilns and all fingers are crossed that our venerable hop picking machine lasts for just one more season.

The only exception to these hoppy thoughts is our forthcoming September Beef Collection Day which will be on Friday 23rd September and the magnificent beef sides are hanging in the butcher’s cold room at Rowledge as I write. Bridget and I look forward to seeing everyone for fresh coffee, cake, biscuits and prior to that your order for Hampton Beef.

How about a 10 kg bag of prime beef with all the joints, steaks, mince and stewing, or a 4kg of the same but just reduced a bit in weight and more manageable for some? Given this amazing weather a Hampton Barbeque Bag could be just the job and will give you steaks, sausages and those absolutely delicious Hampton 100% Beef burgers. Just the ticket for the Indian summer. Will it last?

We are always happy to supply any amount of any cut or joint that anyone is hankering for. Some orders are to the tune of for instance; one roasting joint, two rump steaks, a packet of Hampton Herby Sausages and a kilo of prime minced beef. Make up whatever you need and we will put it together for you, add our bunch of herbs fresh from the Hampton walled garden and have it ready for you in a Hampton bespoke bag when you come over. Shopping couldn’t be simpler.

Hampton wild venison supplies are looking quite good at the moment and for the most delicious, incredibly flavoured natural meat a haunch of venison is ideal. Easy to cook, easy to eat, and everyone is wowed by your culinary skills. Just remember to rest it for at least a quarter of an hour before carving.

Talking of calving the last calf of the season was born yesterday, and a very bonny heifer (female) calf is up on her feet and feeding well. This brings the total calves born this year to 40 and Im pleased to report successful calvings all round. Just one call to the vet a couple of months ago to help us with a breach birth which most of the family assisted with and a strong male calf emerged.

Back to the hops. This year is the last harvest using our buildings at Dukes Farm Puttenham. The hop gardens remain and we have extended them to give us a new 10 acres of Fuggles Hops, but the buildings will be demolished to make way for five beautifully designed houses. In the meantime, our new hop picking and drying building is being erected on a new site towards Seale where we will have a Bruff hop picking machine (the Rolls Royce model, although still relatively vintage) and an increased drying area with four bespoke kilns instead of our current two.

This is a really exciting development for Hampton Hops and a big investment for the farm in a traditional Surrey crop which we have high hopes for.

Come and say goodbye to the Puttenham Oast and join us for the Hampton Hop Up Pop Up on TUESDAY 20th SEPTEMBER from 6.00pm at Dukes Farm, Dark Lane, Puttenham GU3 1AY. It will be a bit of a party with local beers and Hampton 100% beefburgers on sale and a chance to hear more about our hops. Everyone is invited and Bridget and I look forward to welcoming you to this special evening. It would be really helpful if you could let us know if you are coming so that we can judge beefburger numbers! Special priority is given to all ex hop pickers from any year so do spread the word.

Why not reply when you order your beef, venison, sausages, and your own beefburgers and we will have the pleasure of your company twice in a week?

Beef Collection Day is on Friday 23rd September.

Our final two dates of 2016 are Friday’s 28th October and 2nd December.

Very best wishes from a hoppy Hampton.

Bill and Bridget

Hampton Estate Naturally Reared Produce Newsletter August 2016

Although it’s the holiday season it’s also the barbeque season, the cold beef on a platter season, the lasagne for all the family season and now and again the wow, let’s have a proper roast season. To cater for all these seasons you will need some majestic, succulent, flavoursome and well hung beef and the next Hampton beef collection day is on FRIDAY 19th AUGUST.

Orders are now being taken for;

1. Our very popular barbeque bags which hold 1kg of steak, 12 beef bangers and 8 of our 100% beef burgers.
2. Our really helpful 4kg beef bags featuring steak, a roasting joint and a variety of minced beef, stewing and braising steak
3. Our 10kg Hampton family bags with the same ingredients but in bigger quantities
4. Hampton Herby Sausages (pork) or Hampton Beef Bangers (beef).Six to a pack.
5. Your own made up order no matter how big or small. Think of your favourite joint or steak and just order it. If you simply need a kilo of mince just order it.
6. Hampton 100% beef burgers. Delicious, easy and a winner at every barbeque. Four to a pack.
7. Hampton wild venison. Barbequing a haunch of venison is the height of decadence but so well worth it. Alternatively we have venison fillet, steaks, diced and mince. If you have never tried Hampton venison then now is the time. You won’t be disappointed
8. Hampton Healthy offal. Kidney, liver, heart, oxtail and even tongue is all available and completely delicious. The liver melts in the frying pan, and a slow baked oxtail just oozes flavour.

As always there will be freshly brewed coffee, biscuits and cake when you come to pick up, or a glass of red or white at lunch time and a sausage taster to help you through the day.

Busy, busy on the farm over the past four weeks. We have made all the hay we need for the cows for the winter and each bale has been stacked in the Dutch barn. We have just finished bringing in the barley straw, again for the cows for the winter and the great sunshine has meant that it is wonderfully dry and will be very popular in the bovine world. Again, this has been stacked in the Dutch barn. Adjacent to the barn is our stack of plastic wrapped Lucerne bales also for winter feed, and our larder is now full. Excellent news, especially if you are a Hampton cow.

In the hop gardens the crop is maturing and mini hops are developing as you can see in the photo at the top of the page. In hop speak this is called ‘burr.’ This develops into proper fruit (the hop) over the next four weeks and we will start harvesting the crop at the end of August. Hopefully by the 20th of September all our hops will be picked and dried, and also those belonging to the Hogs Back Brewery which we will bring over to our oast in Puttenham from Tongham.

And in order to do this we will need one or two more students to join the home student team. If you know of any students keen for a job from 7.00am Tuesday 30th August until mid-September who are motivated and keen to get involved please let me know as soon as possible. We offer good rates of pay and the opportunity to join a team for some honest farm work. We will of course be selling decorative hop bines from the hop garden during the picking season. These are brilliant 365 day dry flower arrangements and look great in kitchens, barns, conservatories and wedding marquees. Do ring the estate office on 01483 810465 or email: billbiddell@hamptonestate.co.uk

Don’t forget to put your beef order in as well.

Lots of events have taken place at Hampton this summer, ranging from a party for The Queen’s 90th Birthday, to an estate day for 200 schoolchildren who all learnt about farming, butchery, bees, woodlands and gundog training. Sadly the annual estate cricket match did not take place however there is to be a very special fundraising cricket match at Shackleford on Thursday 25th August when Shackleford will be taking on an international all-stars team called Lashings All Stars. This is a fundraising event for the new Shackleford Pavilion and details are available from: david.hockley07@btinternet.com  who is keen to hear from anyone who can support this event.

Bridget and I really look forward to seeing everyone who is picking up beef on FRIDAY 19th AUGUST and together with Kate in the office we are always happy to advise on specific joints, cuts, or recipes. Just call or email for more info.

Very best for the holidays and some inspired cooking.

Hampton Newsletter June 2016

Our next collection day for all delicious Naturally Reared produce from Hampton is Friday 24th June. I inspected the beef carcass at our butchers where it is hanging for four weeks and the meat looks terrific. It is beautifully marbled with a healthy covering of fat and a rich dark red colour which will provide everyone with the most mouth watering beef available.

The reason we insist on hanging is so that the muscles can stretch. This allows the enzymes to break down the muscle fibres which tenderises the beef. The water content also evaporates from the meat meaning we’re left with dry dark claret meat. The flavour of the bone is allowed to fully develop into the meat and this means you have a much deeper flavoured beef, without the high water content of cheaper meat. It all sounds a bit technical but the result is worth it every time.

And this delicious meat is available in whatever amount you wish to buy. Come and pick up a pack of mince and a roasting joint, or head our way for just two steaks. We can make up any order which you would like so long as we are not sold out of that particular joint or cut. And with your order comes not only a hessian Hampton bag and a bunch of fresh herbs from the walled garden but also fresh coffee, tea and cake. What a way to shop!

We are really delighted that Charlie from The Cold Pressed Oil Company will be joining us again this month selling their delicious local rapeseed oil, with a multitude of infusions .I know that many of our customers have like us,  become devotees of their oil so remember to come and collect with your cheque book.

A new idea which we found extremely popular last month is our 4kg beef bag. This holds 2 rump steaks, a roasting joint of 1.5kgs, 1kg of prime minced beef, and a kilo of braising and stewing beef. This covers all the bases and doesn’t have quite the bulk of our 10kg family bags, which are also available every month as usual.

And also in the ordering department there is the very handy Hampton Barbeque Bag, which has 4 steaks, 12 beef sausages and 8 of our 100% beef burgers. Just get that charcoal lit and the beers in.

To summarise, order as little or as much as you need. We also offer 10kg or 4kg mixed bags and during the summer a barbeque bag. Simple really!

Click here office@hamptonestate.co.uk and reserve your beef for FRIDAY 24th JUNE and we will have your bag ready and waiting.

It’s always great to see our customers and have a chat and last month we were delighted to be serenaded by the mums with prams. What the collective noun for prams is I’m not sure but the picture above shows how sensible Hampton beef customers are bringing up their children by feeding them only the best ingredients! After a biscuit and a cup of coffee they all headed round the garden and then picked up their beef for the month. Welcome to our latest recruits.

Our new bull Petworth Regent has just been put in with the cows and we hope will cope with his new field mates. They all have a good amount of very tasty grass in the park, and in fact grass throughout the estate is growing well. Our hay fields look promising for the end of June haymaking season and I hope that the Lucerne will be cut in the next 10 days which will make our first silage of the year. Each round bale will be wrapped in black plastic which will ensile, or pickle the Lucerne making it delicious feed for the cows in the winter.

Thanks to all who joined in the Woodland Woggle 10k run around the estate in early May and to those who joined in The Ride in the Park a week later. Both events went really well and significant funds for the United Parish Churches and the Scouts were raised as a result.

This month we host our annual schools day and we expect around 200 children for a day to experience different Hampton enterprises, from forestry and fencing to cow and calf rearing. At Myrtles Courtyard on Saturday 11th June we celebrate Her Majesty the Queen’s 90th birthday with a Royal Barn Dance. There are tickets still available and the evening includes a Royal Hampton Beef Curry.

Please order your beef as soon as you can, and Bridget, Kate and I look forward to seeing everyone on FRIDAY 24th JUNE. Our next beef day will not be until Friday 19th August so another good reason to stock up.

Coffee, cakes, tea and all good things available from 10.30am on the 24th.

Best wishes

Bill and Bridget

Hampton Newsletter May 2016

The early barbeque season is upon us and Hampton beef is available and ready for you to order at our next collection day on FRIDAY 27th MAY. We have lots of steak, sausages and our wonderful 100%beefburgers but why not branch out and barbeque a rib? Or why not set the barbeque a bit lower and slow roast a silverside, baste it loads as you savour a Hogs Back Beer and add a little oak or cherry to the charcoal to give a delicate smoke? Or have a complete change and barbeque some Hampton Wild Venison steaks which will be mouth-wateringly good and provide a great talking point for the barbeque chef. Barbequing is fun and right on point. Don’t miss out. Alternatively our well established Hampton BBQ bag holds four good sized steaks, 8 beef burgers and twelve beef sausages and still costs just £50.

As always our traditional Hampton Family Bags are available holding 10kgs of prime Hampton beef including steak, roasts, mince and stewing or braising steak. Everything you need for any recipe imaginable (which includes beef).

Following feed back from customers we are delighted to introduce new this month a very handy 4kg Hampton Convenient beef bag. This holds 2 rump steaks, a 1.5kg family roasting joint, 1kg of prime minced beef, 0.5kg of best stewing steak and 0.5 kg of juicy braising steak. All this for £60 and packaged as usual in a convenient Hampton hessian bag.

And if that sounds like a bit too much then we make up any order you wish. For instance, a topside joint, two kilos of braising steak and a packet of sausages is just as good and will be ready and waiting for you.

Venison is definitely available this month and we have a good supply of haunches at present. This is fabulous meat and we also have diced and minced venison which make the best casseroles and bolognaises.

And for those adventurous chefs who push the barriers there is excellent and very tasty liver, heart, kidney and even tongue. All well worth an experiment if you’ve never tried them before.

Come and see us on FRIDAY 27th MAY for a big cup of coffee or tea, some of Bridget’s freshly baked cakes and biscuits and pick up your beef accompanied as always with fresh herbs from the Hampton walled garden. But do put your order in to avoid disappointment and email Kate at office@hamptonestate.co.uk and CLICK NOW to get things going.

The new hop gardens at Puttenham are really taking shape and the first half of the field is nearing completion. There is only one man in the country who puts up new hop gardens and very luckily he has been working with us over the winter. The oak anchor blocks were sunk in the ground last October and the basic posts and wire put in place. In November we planted the new hop plants and in April the contractors returned to continue construction. This year we will not be harvesting the new hops but they need to have strings to be trained to or canes in the other section and these are now largely in place.

The cows are enjoying their new fresh spring grass either in the park, on the slopes of the Hogs Back or in the water meadows by the River Wey. The calves are growing well and love the sun on their backs, and the exceptional grass quality at this time of year means that the mothers have good supplies of high quality milk.

The annual Ride in the Park takes place here at Hampton on Sunday 22nd May. The garden is open, the drives are for bikes and pedal power only and there will be a wonderful tea at Myrtles Courtyard. Do come. The Loseley Ice Cream van will also be making a guest appearance.

Please put Friday 27th May in your diary and Bridget and I look forward to seeing everyone coming for beef and all things Naturally Reared. Coffee and cake from 10.30am onwards.

Our next beef day will be on Friday 24th June.

Very best wishes,

Hampton Newsletter April 2016

At last there is a bit of warmth to the air, the daffs are still blooming, and the grass is beginning to grow. Which means it is April and it’s time for a Hampton April beef collection day which is on FRIDAY 29th APRIL. Two magnificent carcasses have been hanging in our butchers cold store since the end of March and this grass fed, pedigree reared, flavour filled beef is available for you to order.

Our ever popular 10kilo bag holds a mixture of delicious cuts, steaks, minced beef and joints and at £118 is terrific value. If it sounds like a bit too much do not worry. Our brilliant culinary team in the office of Kate and Bridget can assemble any order no matter how big or small. A 2 kg piece of silverside with a kilo of minced beef and two kilos of skirt keeps everyone on their toes. Absolutely delicious. Feather steak needs to be tried, slow cooked brisket is to die for and short ribs braised for a morning with herbs, red wine and a clove of garlic goes down a treat. Alternatively a double rib carvery joint will be the most popular dish cooked in April and a triple rib even better if the whole team is at home. There is so much to choose from, including some of the tastiest offal in the form of liver, kidney and tongue.

But don’t forget our Hampton Herby Sausages and our Hampton Beef Bangers which are a staple part of the menu and incredibly popular. So too is the elusive Hampton Wild Venison which once tasted is never forgotten. Venison steaks are some of the best wild meat known to man, simply because our deer are roe deer, smaller than red, far more tender and live on a foraging diet kindly provided by the flora and fauna of the estate. A venison haunch on the bone feeds at least six, even eight and can be the highlight of the culinary month. We have loads of excellent recipes if needed including a cassoulet of venison shoulder which even I can make.

Please email or ring in your order and fresh coffee, tea, cake, (the chef has still to decide on this month’s speciality) and biscuits, not to mention sausage tasters and a glass or two of red will all be floating around ready for your enjoyment.

Talking of enjoyment two Hampton events come up soon. SUNDAY 22nd May sees the annual Hampton Ride in the Park. The garden is open for you to wander around and enjoy, the drives are closed to all motor traffic, and we welcome bikes, skate boards, roller blades, prams, pushchairs, zimmers, and any other kind of self-propelled transport operated by young and old to have a go in a safe environment for the afternoon. Daughter feeling a bit nervous of her first new bike? Come and have a ride and throw away the stabilisers. There is also a first class tea provided by the magnificent ladies of the WI, plus a Loseley Ice Cream Van and the event is in order to raise funds for the United Parish of Seale, Sands Puttenham and Wanborough. Entry via the Cuttmill Entrance is £3.50 per person for the whole afternoon.

Three weeks later on SATURDAY 11th JUNE the estate is hosting The Queen’s 90th Birthday Community Barn Dance Bash at Myrtles Courtyard Hampton Estate from 7.00pm. The evening kicks off with a glass of bubbly on the house, dancing is to our local Second Front Band and supper will be a right royal Hampton beef curry with all the trimmings followed by strawberries and cream. There is a cash bar, lots of music, prizes for the best dressed table, the dress code is ‘wear a hat’ and again all proceeds will go to the United Parish.

Tickets are available from Amy Rider, email;-  hamptonsbarndance@gmail.com and cost just £20 for adults and £10 for children.

More details are on our website www.hamptonestate.co.uk and do join us if you can.

Born out in the field on the farm we have had 17 fit and healthy calves from 17 delighted cows with 30 more to calve over the next few months. As soon as the grass really starts to grow we can send them out into grazing fields around the estate, which in all likelihood will be at about the same time as the beef day. Hop plants are just starting to grow, and the hop gardens have been strung and cultivations taken place. Fences have been repaired and in the woods chestnut coppicing and tree planting has finished.

Bridget and I really look forward to seeing you on Friday 29th April for a chat and a cup of coffee but please do put your order in as soon as possible to avoid any disappointment.

Our following collection day is Friday 27th May, just before half term.

Best wishes

Bill and Bridget

Hampton Newsletter February 2016

Spring is on its way……….

As promised our next beef collection day will be on FRIDAY 18th MARCH. This is slightly out of kilter but the reason is that Easter is the following weekend and we want to give as many as possible the chance to be eating Hampton produce over the long weekend. Possibly an Easter roast, or an Easter lasagne, or for the brave an Easter barbeque, not to mention sausages ready for breakfast and Hampton venison prepared for a special dinner, the possibilities are endless.

We have lots of beef ready to be ordered from 10kg family bags with a variety of steaks, joints and cuts, to our bespoke ordering service where you can order just as little or as much as you like. We regularly take orders for simply a kilo of mince and a small roasting joint, and they are as important to us as an order for 10 kilos of mince, 5 kilos of braising steak and a rib roast to feed 12. Or try and fox us with an order for feather steak, shin and short ribs.  We will also have lots of Hampton Herby sausages and Hampton Beef Bangers and Hampton 100% beef burgers are also important in the mix. Venison supplies are reasonably good and a recent success in the kitchen has been venison cassoulet using shoulder of venison cooked slowly with loads of herbs, tomatoes and haricot beans. Our recipe books will be out and ready for inspection all day.

I’m delighted to report that Hampton Special Beef Pies are on the menu for Easter so please put in your order as soon as possible to ensure everything is ready for you on collection day.

Fresh coffee will be brewing from 10.30am and Bridget’s homemade cakes and biscuits will be on the table as always, so that everyone is well fed and topped up with enthusiasm for some excellent cooking.

The cow calving season is almost upon us, with the first calving scheduled for the second week in March. This means more cow checks, increasing from one to three times a day, to keep an eye on things in the field, although if possible we leave the cow to calve itself rather than help out too early in the process. Nature needs to be left alone and the skill from our end is knowing for how long.

Cow and calf will spend the next six months together, always outside, with the calf suckling on a very regular basis, and our breed of Sussex cows make excellent mothers who seem to take their responsibilities very seriously.

Two weeks ago we had our two year TB test, where all breeding stock was tested over a four day period for TB. It’s a concerning time (as Adam Hanson is very good at explaining on Countryfile) because the last thing any farm wants is a cow or several cows which show a positive reaction, as the implications are enormous. Im pleased to report that we had a clean bill of health, and we also took the opportunity to blood test all the stock so that we know we have the highest possible health status.

Calving may be a few days away but our resident pair of Egyptian geese have stolen a march by hatching five goslings and proudly taking them on a walk across the drive and over the cattle grid. No mean feat. We also have a pair of Red Kite’s making a nest close by on the edge of Puttenham Common. They seem to be able to take large amounts of timber in their beaks to prodigious heights and Bridget I know is very concerned that they might see our Norwich terrier, Ivy, as a tasty lunch.

Thank you to everyone who took so much interest in my hop stringing job request earlier in February. Three excellent hop stringers are working away in the garden and have brought with them some great sunny and relatively still conditions, perfect for perfecting their new found skills. We managed to grab the few frosty mornings to drive onto the gardens and carry out repairs to poles and wires and we are now waiting for the hop garden building team to return to erect the rest of the new gardens in the field heading out of Puttenham towards Seale.

Please send over, email or telephone your order for beef, sausages, venison and pies and Bridget and I really look forward to seeing everyone on Friday March 18th or our next day April 29th.

Best wishes

Bill and Bridget

Hampton Newsletter January 2016

Warming casseroles, Hampton beef pies and succulent roasts……..

For the first time this winter it’s chilly, frosty and sunny and all our thoughts are turning to beef stews, heart-warming casseroles and delicious steak pies. This is all because our first beef day of the New Year is rapidly approaching on FRIDAY 5th FEBRUARY and we will be open from 10.30am to approximately 3.30pm with fresh coffee, newly baked cakes, glasses of red and sausage tasters. The beef day was originally in the diary for the end of January but with Christmas and New Year holidays at the slaughter house we could not guarantee to hang the carcass for our required four weeks, hence the slide into February. All good things come to he who waits!

We have plenty of delicious dark, red, well hung meat for ordering, from our 10kg family beef bags with a bit of everything, to our bespoke ordering service. Those making large casseroles might want extra stewing and braising steak. That large spag boll will need loads of mince and of course the beat the winter blues barbeque needs steaks and plenty of them. Personally I think that a roast of prime rib is the ultimate for flavour and wow factor which pleases the traditionalists, pleases those in need of seconds, and delights anyone who makes thick flavoursome gravy and loves winter roast veg as an accompaniment. Order at least a double rib for maximum effect.

The best beef news of 2016 so far is that we will also have Hampton Special Beef Pies for sale. Packed with Hampton beef, shrouded in homemade pastry and cooked to the secret Hampton recipe which is always a winner, book your pies now to avoid massive disappointment.

Hampton Herby Sausages and Hampton Beef Bangers are available for ordering and come in handy packs of six. Supplies of Hampton wild venison are low at present but our stalker is out and about all day at this time of the year so this could change at any moment. We enjoyed an oak smoked haunch of Hampton venison last weekend and as always we marvelled at its flavour and succulence.

We also have good supplies of offal if anyone is feeling brave. The liver is really delicious and the kidney will work brilliantly in your own S and K pie.  So please place your beef order by email or over the phone and we will ensure that it is all packed and waiting for you on the 5th FEBRUARY.

The cows and calves look well on their winter diet and are pottering around the driest fields. We will be pregnancy testing all the herd at the beginning of February to check how far each mum is in calf and this gives us a rough calving calendar for the spring and summer. Its not an exact science but should help. The calves are loving the lucerne silage we made last summer which is high in protein and extremely palatable and we drop the round bales into their feeding trailers for a self-service 24 hour buffet.

11,000 hop plants were planted in our new Puttenham hop garden back in early December and Mr Mervyn Carless from Herefordshire will be back in the spring to complete building the new wire work and poles which he started with his gang in the autumn. It’s all go in the hops.

We have planning consent to erect our new hop picking and drying shed which will be a fantastic facility for the farm and will be located midway between Puttenham and Seale. This will help with transporting the Hogs Back Brewery hops which we will pick and dry again this year. However, progress on the new building has been delayed by the planning system, and for our 2016 harvest we will be picking and drying once more in Puttenham. The aroma of Fuggles hops in the village will still be present in September.

In the woods we are coppicing chestnut which makes excellent fencing stakes and hop poles, and we will soon be replanting the areas in Britty Wood and Totford Wood which we clear-felled a year ago. Thousands of new trees have been delivered, a mixture of chestnut and pine, and this is the perfect time to plant.

This is also the perfect time to order your Hampton Naturally Reared Produce, so do have a look in the post-Christmas empty freezer, work out what you need and send over your requirements. Bridget and I look forward to seeing everyone on Friday February 5th and hearing of resolutions, diets, and plans for the year.

Very best wishes to all,

Bill and Bridget

Our Next day is Friday 18th March