Behind the scenes at Coombeshead, a destination restaurant and guesthouse in the Cornish countryside
A couple of miles south of Launceston there is a turning off the A30, the main artery into Cornwall. The road winds up a hill through the tiny village of Lewannick with its tall church tower, before descending into a valley where an elegant stone farmhouse sits snugly among deciduous woodland. This is a landscape of fern-covered banks, pastureland dotted with grazing sheep and cattle, and views stretching towards the coast.
Coombeshead, once the home farm of the Trelaske Estate, was described in the Agricultural Gazette in 1848 as ‘beautifully situated in a romantic valley well clothed with wood and adorned with water’. The bay-fronted farmhouse stands in an elevated position at the head of a courtyard, flanked by slate-roofed agricultural buildings, commanding vistas over green pastures and woodland.
Tom Adams and his partner Lottie Mew bought the property in 2016. As well as the 18th-century farmhouse, it comprises several converted barns and 66 acres of mixed perennial grazing land, woods and meadows. Here, the couple has established a guesthouse, restaurant, bakery and working farm. The story of how they discovered this magical place is unlike most. It was not the promise of rural isolation or even the lure of a life in hospitality that first brought them here: it was a butcher and his pigs.
Living in London, Tom was a wunderkind chef, running Pitt Cue restaurant in Soho, where customers queued round the block to eat his hipster Americana barbecued meat. ‘We would typically begin at 7am and finish around midnight – we’d do around 150 covers a day,’ he recalls. The quality of the ingredients was key – especially the pork. So Tom made weekly visits to his Launceston-based butcher, Philip Warren. ‘A close relationship led us to keep pigs on one of his farms,’ Tom explains. ‘A big factor was to have a consistent connection to the product I was cooking.’ Tom and Lottie, who worked in sustainability solutions for Veolia, had not planned to leave London, but when Philip told them about a farm that was up for sale nearby, the pull of the land and the chance to grow and rear all the produce themselves was too great.
Together, they have created an idyllic place where guests can stay in comfort, lose themselves in the landscape, and enjoy meticulously grown and lovingly prepared food. Tom, baby faced, with tousled fair hair and black-framed spectacles, describes this as a British version of Italian agriturismo, with the animals and the seasonal produce providing ingredients for a weekly changing menu.
Lottie was six months pregnant with their first child, Olive, when they moved in April 2016. ‘We opened for business on the 23rd of June, so it was rapid,’ says Tom. Friends and family pulled together to get the house ready for the crucial summer trading months. ‘Lottie and my mother were essential in the renovation and redecoration of the house,’ he adds. ‘We had to do it on a shoestring, so we were lucky that lots of our friends came down and helped paint, sand floorboards and knock down walls. There was a lot of rummaging in local antique shops.’ The end result is a guesthouse that looks and feels like a very comfortable home. ‘Keeping things simple was always at the forefront. Hopefully, the spaces allow people to relax and settle in. We are lucky to have nice old stone buildings that do a lot of the work for us,’ says Tom, who focused on the restaurant, which started as a communal dining room in the guesthouse, while Lottie managed the front of house and the garden, growing vegetables and flowers, both outside and in the big wooden-framed greenhouse.
They tried to keep it as a small operation initially. ‘At first, everything took place in the house, which has space for 10 guests. But we knew it had a limited shelf life,’ Tom says. Communal dining during a time of political unrest had its challenges. ‘There was the Trump inauguration and the Brexit referendum within a year. That meant plenty of tricky conversations round the table – I felt I had to be a peacekeeper,’ he explains laughing.
They have since expanded the restaurant by converting one of the barns to seat 30, offering lunch and dinner. Lottie’s relaxed style is in evidence here, too, with chairs draped with sheepskins and food served on locally made ceramics. Much of the cooking takes place in an open fire and wooden shelves are laden with homemade pickles, ferments and cordials, created with foraged berries and fruit. It feels like a Cornish version of Nordic chic.
Coombeshead Bakery, in a former stable block, is run by Ben Glazer. Visitors praise the signature sourdough, made with organic heritage wheat, spelt and rye grains grown and milled by Fred Price at regenerative Gothelney Farm in Somerset. Along with supplying the guesthouse and restaurant with bread, malt loaf and brioche, Ben and his team bake 3,000 loaves a week, which are sent out to restaurants, hotels and farm shops round the country.
Beef and lamb for the restaurant kitchen is provided by Graham Dawe, whose Red Devon cattle and Romney sheep graze on Coombeshead’s clover-rich pasture, haylage, hedgerows and trees, improving the farm’s soil quality while they benefit from an outdoor life. Tom, Lottie and their team also rear specialist breeds of chickens, keep beehives and maintain a no-dig market garden, which is pesticide and herbicide free, fed by homemade com-post. Developing agroforestry is the next project, with apple, pear, plum and cherry trees interplanted with gooseberries, blackcurrants, artichokes and rhubarb.
We walk through the herb garden, where spiky clouds of rosemary, salvias and thyme grow under tripods of sweet peas. A peek into the greenhouse reveals a mass of tomato plants and nasturtiums. Tom bubbles with enthusiasm as we set off up the hill to admire his curly-haired Mangalitza piglets. A recent addition are Bresse Gauloise and Naked Neck chickens. They forage in the coppiced woodland and perennial herbal ley, supplemented by Fred’s soy-free grains and pulses. Along with natural and varied feed, it is the time taken to produce exceptional-flavoured meat that Tom feels makes all the difference. The pigs have up to two years to mature, rather than an industry standard of six months. ‘It’s all to do with healthy fat, which only comes from slow growth,’ he explains. Nutritional lab tests found high levels of omega-3 and polyunsaturated fats in the meat, which back up this careful methodology.
Now the parents of two children – Lottie was pregnant with their son, Woody, when we visited – the couple has different requirements. Tom would like to spend fewer evenings in the kitchen and more time building up his production of cured hams; Lottie would like to get back in the garden now the children are slightly older. ‘Next winter, we will have as many as 50 pigs. We have just got accreditation for wholesale ham production,’ says Tom. London restaurants Bouchon Racine and Brawn are already serving Coombeshead’s outstanding cured meats and Tom is rightly proud of the ham production space he has developed here. The smell is overwhelmingly sweet and earthy, and cuts hang like chandeliers from the ceiling, cradled in twine nets. It is a cathedral of charcuterie.
Over the past eight years, Coombeshead has grown and grown. There is now a cottage as well as nine guest rooms, an online shop and workshops on baking, butchery and printmaking. There is a magic to this place. It is not just an embodiment of a rural fantasy but a living example of passion, culinary excellence and respect for natural life.
Tom Griffiths1/13Tom and Lottie enjoy a walk through the Cornish estate with their daughter Olive.
Tom Griffiths2/13Lottie cutting dahlias in the garden, which she uses to create arrangements that brighten the rooms of the guesthouse.
Tom Griffiths3/13Lottie and Olive arranging flowers.
4/13The guesthouse hallway sets the tone for rooms beyond, with artwork by Tom’s artist-turned-winemaker brother Ben displayed above a rustic wooden table found at an antiques market in Somerset.
5/13Head chef Rose Maxwell.
Tom Griffiths6/13Gauloise chicken with carrots and sage is a favourite summer dish here.
Tom Griffiths7/13Head baker Ben Glazer with his signature sourdough, which is made with organic heritage wheat, spelt and rye grains, and is popular with customers for its deep, nutty flavour and springy, tender texture.
Tom Griffiths8/13Mangalitza Coppa cured on site as part of Tom’s new ham venture.
9/13Lottie with local potter Rebecca Proctor, who creates distinctive tableware for Coombeshead.
Tom Griffiths10/13Head grower Ryan Pooles works in the no-dig market garden.
Tom Griffiths11/13There are six hives in the orchard.
Tom Griffiths12/13The hives are managed by local beekeeper Nick Bentham-Green.
Tom Griffiths13/13Tom and Lottie catching up over a coffee in the gardens.
