The story
Set amongst 66 acres of meadows, woodland and oak-lined streams, Coombeshead Farm is a working farm and guesthouse in the heart of Cornwall’s rural countryside. The restaurant offers a set menu built from what the farm produces: meat from outdoor-reared cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens and guineafowl, plus vegetables from the market garden and orchards. The cooking is rooted in the land, and the kitchen makes full use of the farm’s own butchery and bakery.
The dining room is open Thursday through Sunday, serving a multi-course dinner that changes with the season. A sample menu might include baked artichoke, country sourdough with Guernsey butter, preserved swede, Mangalitza loin with swede and brassicas, and a beeswax ice cream or muscovado tart to finish. A vegetarian version is also offered, with dishes like salt baked swede and brassicas, Crown Prince squash with smoked cream and oat miso, and a kohlrabi salad. The food is direct, precise, and deeply connected to the farm’s daily rhythms.
Coombeshead Farm’s approach has earned it a Michelin Recommended status, a recognition that speaks to the integrity of its country cooking. The bakery on site produces sourdough loaves from heritage wheats, spelt and rye—much of it stone ground on the farm—and supplies restaurants and shops across the country. A small onsite shop sells produce from the farm and from local makers, and provisions such as air-dried Mangalitza ham and hot-smoked sausages are available for mail order.
For those who want to stay, there are nine bed & breakfast rooms in the farmhouse, or a self-catered two-bed Courtyard Cottage. Through the winter, the restaurant and rooms close, and the farm is available for private hire.
Recognition
Ambience
Details
History
Coombeshead is a working, developing farm with owner Tom Adams making new decisions all the time about what livestock to keep, what to grow that will best suit the soils, and how to present the bounty of the land to its best advantage. The accommodation aspect of the business is its principal attraction (not least for the excellent breakfasts) but a four-course evening menu at £65 is well worth a detour. Proceedings open with the famously good bread served with sunny-yellow farmhouse butter before a starter of mangalitza pork terrine or a simple preparation of just-picked vegetables. Main courses could be a hefty leg of guinea fowl, served with stewed tomato and string beans, plus dressed salad leaves. Our inspector's dessert – a perfectly rendered frangipane tart of haskap berries with clotted cream – felt like the best kind of farmhouse cooking. As for wine, it's a matter of browsing the cellars for yourself and picking out something suitable. If you've arrived hot-foot from far away, take a long, meandering wander around the fields. Smell the wild garlic. Look at the chickens and the piglets. Relax.
Location
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