IMAGES: MARCO KESSELER; GETTY; RARE & PASTURE; GARY HOLPIN


EAT SOUTH DEVON The humble farm shop has become a gourmet go-to in this beach-blessed


slice of the South West, where rolling hills also host medal-winning wineries and distillers make spirits recalling Devon’s rum-running pirate days


WORDS: SAR AH BARREL L


“Local craft ale was once a favourite, but ciders, particularly small-batch, are back,” says Greendale Farm Shop’s ruddy-cheeked Rich Jones, holding up a jerrycan labelled ‘Proper Job’. “It’s a Devon scrumpy made with our apples by Keith Hosein, an 80-year-old local farmer who still uses a hand crusher.” A Devon farm shop stocked with cider is no


surprise, but what is astonishing is Greendale’s multitude of local goods, from veggies, cheese, meat and preserves to pastries, sourdough, ice cream and souvenirs. All are either produced on site or are West Country sourced, filling a giant barn and outbuildings akin to a rustic mall. “The shop started 15 years ago, selling farm eggs from a roadside shed,” says Rich. “But during Covid we really became a community hub and have grown a lot since.” Not only has Greendale’s restaurant capacity doubled, queues for its weekend ‘farmer’s breakfast’ go out the door. It’s also home to a chippie, which shifts 200 kilos of fish from Friday to Sunday. Yet quality, as well as quantity, prevails.


People travel cross-county for its butcher’s handmade sausages and four-week-matured boned steak. Lobster tanks, house-smoked fish and a bounty of local catch grace the wet-fish counter. Above it, photos feature Greendale’s fishing fleet in action at its harbour bases in Brixham, Newlyn and Exeter.


52 NATIONALGEOGRAPHIC.COM/TRAVEL Large-scale farm shops like Greendale are


becoming the norm here in South Devon, dotting the county’s rolling pasturelands. In fact, there’s another just minutes from Greendale — Darts Farm, a ‘lifestyle shopping destination’ that’s grown out of a farm hut. And, while South Devon farm-food enterprises like Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s River Cottage and Riverford Organic Farmers’ veg boxes have long garnered national attention, a multitude of other local farm-food powerhouses has blossomed in recent years. Just south along the River Exe, something


else is flourishing. I follow lanes twittering with spring life, to Exmouth, where the vineyard at Lympstone Manor Estate has just produced its first classic cuvée. Rows of vines lend Continental panache to the hotel’s grounds, which rake steeply from Georgian manor to estuary. Premium sparkling wine was Lympstone’s headline mission in 2018 when planting Chardonnay, Pinot Meunier and Pinot Noir, but the latter has so far yielded the biggest surprise. “After 2020’s long, hot summer, we let the Pinot Noir grapes hang,” says Lympstone’s Steve Edwards, referring to the practice of harvesting grapes for red wines later than usual. “It’s always a risk — frost and fungus are a terror in this country,” says the Australian ex-pat, “but we won gold at the 2023 International Wine Challenge.” Not bad for a first harvest,


Clockwise from top left: Milk bread with lion’s mane mushroom, cep foam and caerphilly from Somerset’s Westcombe Dairy, served at Circa; the red cliff face that forms part of Salcombe Hill, near Sidmouth; Rare & Pasture’s Organic Country Pâté; houses built around Bayard’s Cove Fort, Dartmouth


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86  |  Page 87  |  Page 88  |  Page 89  |  Page 90  |  Page 91  |  Page 92  |  Page 93  |  Page 94  |  Page 95  |  Page 96  |  Page 97  |  Page 98  |  Page 99  |  Page 100  |  Page 101  |  Page 102  |  Page 103  |  Page 104  |  Page 105  |  Page 106  |  Page 107  |  Page 108  |  Page 109  |  Page 110  |  Page 111  |  Page 112  |  Page 113  |  Page 114  |  Page 115  |  Page 116  |  Page 117  |  Page 118  |  Page 119  |  Page 120  |  Page 121  |  Page 122  |  Page 123  |  Page 124  |  Page 125  |  Page 126  |  Page 127  |  Page 128  |  Page 129  |  Page 130  |  Page 131  |  Page 132  |  Page 133  |  Page 134  |  Page 135  |  Page 136  |  Page 137  |  Page 138  |  Page 139  |  Page 140  |  Page 141  |  Page 142  |  Page 143  |  Page 144  |  Page 145  |  Page 146  |  Page 147  |  Page 148  |  Page 149  |  Page 150  |  Page 151  |  Page 152  |  Page 153  |  Page 154  |  Page 155  |  Page 156  |  Page 157  |  Page 158  |  Page 159  |  Page 160  |  Page 161  |  Page 162  |  Page 163  |  Page 164  |  Page 165  |  Page 166  |  Page 167  |  Page 168  |  Page 169  |  Page 170  |  Page 171  |  Page 172  |  Page 173  |  Page 174  |  Page 175  |  Page 176  |  Page 177  |  Page 178  |  Page 179  |  Page 180  |  Page 181  |  Page 182  |  Page 183  |  Page 184  |  Page 185  |  Page 186  |  Page 187  |  Page 188  |  Page 189  |  Page 190  |  Page 191  |  Page 192  |  Page 193  |  Page 194  |  Page 195  |  Page 196