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THE CHEFS | back Since 2007 I have been working with a number of chefs who are dedicated to seasonal produce, grown or foraged with care and attention to quality. These are chefs who are creative, experimental and keen to get as close to the source of their ingredients as possible. After supplying the Gurnards Head in Zennor and the Lime Tree in Penzance with wild food for 12 months I began to appreciate how fantastic these ingredients can become in the hands of talented cooks. I have built up relationships with the following chefs, who now cook for Fat Hen on the Gourmet Wild Food Weekends and other events:

Mark Devonshire

MARK DEVONSHIRE Fat Hen is excited to welcome Mark Devonshire to the team. I have been searching for a new chef to help at Fat Hen and was very pleased to find Mark. Mark was born in Cornwall and has always had a love of food. He is a firm advocate of local ingredients and promoting our great British produce. He began his career under the tutorage of Rick Stein at The Seafood Restaurant in Padstow and spent 17 years there, the last 8 of which were as head lecturer at the Padstow Seafood School. Here he found his true vocation as a teacher and was able to inspire other chefs and students with his vision of cooking under the guise of Rick's recipes.

After Padstow he sought a new challenge and went to work at a cookery school based on a working farm in Eckington, Worcester. After cooking wholly with fish at Rick Stein's he had the opportunity to cook with the best quality meat from their herd of Aberdeen Angus and Highland cattle. Here he also learnt the art of artisan bakery, preserving local ingredients and managing a cookery school. He decided to return to his home county of Cornwall after eighteen months and to full time teaching. He is now a lecturer at Cornwall College where he teaches students aged sixteen and upwards. He is happiest teaching people who, like himself, appreciate the true pleasures of creating great food. Mark will be cooking on some of Fat Hen's Gourmet Wild Food Weekends.

MATT WILLIAMSON & CLAIRE THOMSON Matt and Claire are Fat Hen's original husband and wife cooking team. They are both passionate about wild and seasonal ingredients, foraged or grown with care. They met whilst working at the Chelsea Arts Club 10 years ago, and have worked together at home and abroad in various kitchens until 2009, when they opened their own restaurant, Flinty Red in Bristol. I met Matt and Claire in 2007 when they worked and lived in Cornwall. Claire and I were both pregnant at the same time and met at pre-natal yoga. I discovered that Matt was the head chef of the popular gastropub, The Gurnards Head, and that he loved using wild food. I began to supply the pub weekly with wild food and each time I dropped my delivery to him, I got a taste of the latest wild dish he was concocting in the kitchen. I was immediately blown away by the unique way he was incorporating the ingredients into his cooking and soon asked if they would come and cook for Fat Hen. Matt and Claire have been working with me since Fat Hen's inception but 2 children, a busy restaurant and a full life in Bristol means that they cannot come down to Cornwall regularly. I will, however, be taking wild food up to Bristol for Fat Hen Wild Tasting Suppers at Flinty Red.

Matt Williamson, Claire Thomson & Family

Justin Ashton Miki Ashton

JUSTIN & MIKI ASHTON Justin and Miki cook for Fat Hen at various wild food lunch and dinner events (see below). I met them in 2007, when they were proprietors of the 'The Lime Tree' in Penzance. I supplied them with wild food at their restaurant on a weekly basis for 12 months, and spent a lot of my social evenings at the Lime Tree lounging on their beautiful furnishings, munching tapas and supping wine, whilst catching up with my girl friends. Since then they have moved on from the Lime Tree to work on other ventures. Justin is the executive chef of The Beach, Sennen, whilst Miki runs their event catering business, Lime Tree Catering. The largest event that Justin and Miki have worked on with Fat Hen was a Wild Dinner in Plymouth for 70 people. This was part of a dining project by the artists Lucy and Jorge Orta, and was a dinner based around the theme of sustainability. With the help of some volunteers we foraged for the large majority of the ingredients whilst supplementing with local seasonal produce. The food miles for each ingredient were calculated, as was the carbon footprint of the whole event. This was illustrated by local artists on huge blackboards around the dining hall. More about this event here. Sample Menus for Fat Hen Gourmet Wild Food Weekends can be viewed here. back

Location & Contact : Fat Hen, Gwenmenhir, Boscawen-noon Farm, St Buryan, Penzance, Cornwall TR19 6EH | Tel. 01736 810156 | caroline@fathen.org