25 MILE

The 25 Mile Peninsula

St Davids Head = Caer Bwdy Bay

Collins Road Atlas Lookout

Crochendy Pottery Aprons

Melin Tregwynt Knitting Needles & Wool Ball

Melin Tregwynt - Welsh Weaving For Japan

Welsh Blanket

Wales National Wool Museum

Ty Pen Pownd at Wool Museum

Welsh Spinning Wheels

Vintage Flat Bed Knitting Machine

Cows relaxing on Mwnt Beach Head

Owner of Toby Fashions - Cardigan

25M Eating House - Potted Sewin

#31 Get up and run

Lucky Wales trades M25 for 25M 

What happens when a clever little green country, without circular gridlock motorways adopts a marketing strategy to change the adjacency of the letter 'M' from the front of 25 and then pops it back at the end ?

This happens:  25M  

This 3rd blog in the mini series of 'Welsh Favourite Places To Eat' features photographs of the amazing people and places we found within the 25 Mile peninsula. It ends with our arrival at the 25 Mile Local Eating House in Cardigan.

The 25 Mile Local Eating House adopts a simple and intuitive strategy of only serving food that is grown within a twenty-five mile radius of their kitchen. Resulting in local-fresh-quality-ingredients. So simple and so good. Their desire for roasting coffee from good beans being the one understandable geographic exception.

This visit presented my first experience to taste potted Sewin, the Welsh Sea Trout, complete with they're amazing taste and brand story. These very shy fish are only catchable at 4.00am in the morning and have an almost mythical status in their storytelling. Starting their lives as brown river trout, they head out into the wild open oceans of the sea to become Sewin. The full life cycle of these fishy Welsh creatures is still not known by scientists, other than observing they only return to local freshwater rivers when they spawn.

As with all of nature, their existence is rare and threatened and fortunately Sewin are being carefully monitored by those who care about their preservation.

If you are heading to Mwnt for your hols, pop into the 25Mile in Cardigan and head home to preach the gospel and recount the potted history of the potted Sewin.

CAPEL DEWI UCHAF B&B

The Breakfast Banquet

Original 500 Year Old Oak Beams

Fruits and Homemade Preservatives

Home Made Cheese Scones & Everything Else Under The Sun

#30 Flirty Thirty

Wales The Land Of Breakfasts.

No stay in Wales is complete without a breakfast, and no stay in Wales is complete without a  Capel Dewi Uchaf  County House breakfast.

This 500 year old grade II listed farmhouse is nestled along a leafy gravel track, off a windy, leafy country road in the middle of nowhere, in a leafy place called Wales.

The picturesque Local Towy Valley is well known as the Garden Of Wales. The river Towy is also a wonderful spot for fishing for your tea.

Legend has it the Capel Dewi Uchaf breakfast spread is like no other, even the Carmarthen taxi drivers and newsagents who were miles away, referred to its splendour.

The breakfast preparation, rumoured to start at 5.00am is served to all comers at 8.00am in the Baronial style lower end of the house, complete with its grandiose banquet flavour, lovely old original floor tiles and huge oak beams.  It would be a sin to sleep in and miss it.

There is nothing as wonderful as a bespoke a-la-carte breakfast, especially when you are on holiday - without the pressure or awareness of any pressing time zone. We were in no rush to head off to Melin Tregwynt the beautiful weaving mill and family owned business celebrating their 100th birthday.

Fredenas home made Cheese scones were so delicious, we wrapped them up in little paper napkins and took them away for lunch. The cooked breakfast was custom-made to order, with option of a local duck egg and all the tea in Wales. The homemade bread was individual mini loaves all pillow soft and served with lashings of Welsh butter and homemade strawberry jam. Divine.

Our breakfast was a truly ingratiating experience, served by two very gracious hosts. Sadly we are some of the very fortunate, last few punters to sample this breakfast experience, as the lovely owners Fredena & John have decided this summer will be their last one at the house and they are hanging up their B&B awards, to enjoy their summers of retirement. They certainly deserve it for their craft was a fine art.

Da Iawn Diolch.

Capel Dewi Uchaf Country House  

Y POLYN

Wales Is Green And Lovely

Wales Is Off The Beaten Track

The Y Polyn Landmark

Y Polyn Barn Door + Logs

Y Polyn Brand Tag 

Local Welsh Brewed Ale

Welsh Homemade Bread + Welsh Tap Water

Welsh Napkin and Welsh Wood

Cosy Y Polyn Ambience

Y Polyn Decor,  Life breathing in the Walls.

Wednesdays Dinner Menu

Shaved Asparagus Salad, Parmesan, Shallot Vinaigrette

Black Mountain Smoked Salmon, Sweet Pickled Cucumber

A Little Relaxing Interlude

Coracle Caught Towy Salmon, Sauce Vierge

Carmarthenshire Rib Eye Steak, Bearnaise Sauce, Slow Cooked Shallots

Selection Of Local Seasonal Vegetables in Welsh Oven Dish

#29 Your doing fine

Wales is Green and Lovely

This is the first of a mini series of blogs from our recent sojourn to the deepest south west Wales, Pembrokshire. Though blessed to have been born in Wales, I had never ventured so far south-westerly, so we packed snacks into our bags and went along to discover what everyone keeps raving about.

Yes even as a pining Welshman, I truly was stunned by the scenic beauty and the abundant bounty of crafts and skills we found along the way. The affectionate Warm-Welsh -Welcome from the hillsides was less surprising, as I am lucky enough to know this trait well.

Our trip started in Carmarthen and extended to Capel Dewi, Fishguard, Haverfordwest, St Davids, Newport, Cardigan, Mwnt and Cenarth. (The last two destinations are small but perfectly formed.)

One of the reasons for our visit to Wales, was to meet David + Clare, the inspirational owners of the new jean makers in town: HIUT Jeans and as if that pedigree tag wasn't enough,  they are also the conceptual thinkers behind the utterly amazing do lectures.

As this mini series of Welsh blogs unfolds, I will be covering the other amazing places we found along the way.

If you aren't a fan of Wales, never mind, I guess you will come round to it one day.

For those of you who have ventured out to the National Botanic Garden Of Wales, you will know well the area of Capel Dewi - where we stayed our first night.

Of course our reason for staying in Capel Dewi was for another important discovery and that was the table we had booked at Y Polyn a Welsh foodies palace, whose fine reputation for relaxed dining precedes it.

Their tag line:  'Fat Equals Flavour. Live With It'  is particularly apt.

With a different menu for each day of the week, and a staunch promoter of good food and local produce, we thought upon arriving at Y Polyn we had discovered our final resting home. Long gone are the days when you leave London and wonder if there will be anywhere in Wales who can cook good food. These days you leave Wales wondering if there is anywhere in London who can source local food and cook it as well as they do in Wales.

Wales is blessed by rivers, mountains and agricultural land, the perfect landscape for any organic farmer and culinary chef who seeks to excel in promoting quality local produce.

Y Polyn is a great advert for Wales. Please take your compass.

So to Wales. Eat Well. Live Well. Smile often.

THE BUTTERY CAFE

Sloping Hill - Front Facade, Swing Gate

The Main House Of Burgh

A Sense Of Concealed Beauty

Peep Hole

Tucking In

Fresh Baking

Quiet & Elegant 

The Buttery Menu

Smoked Haddock & Salmon Fishcakes with Sweet Chilli Sauce

Pea, Broad Bean, Potato, Mint & Lemon Fritatta

#28 In a State

Good neighbours become best friends.

The Buttery Cafe at Burgh House, Hampstead conjures up a sense of dignified and affluent retirement. [It would be fascinating to unravel the Curriculum Vitaes of the Buttery's regular punters.]  A quiet hilly and leafy retreat away from the swarms of inner London, this is the place to head for if you seek the perfect winter bowl of hearty soup with warm herb scone and butter, or a refreshing summer pick me up of ginger, hazelnut and pumpkin seed flapjack.


I have been coming here for a number of years and it is a perennial favourite. It now feels the right time to blog about it and share this secret destination. Hopefully the Olympic crowds reading this blog wont remember the postcode.


The setting of course is very English and very grand, Burgh House being built in 1704 during Queen Anne's reign. The Buttery sunken snugly into the basement of the main house alongside the hidden garden, manages to feel cosy, familiar and very welcoming.


T B C has prime adjacency to 'Livingstone Studio' run by the impeccably peaceful and elegant Inge Cordsen. This clothing, weaving and ceramic gallery, is a former Coach House, once owned by Burgh House and now displays the most beautiful collection of artists in London, applying their purist craft and design according to Inge's wonderfully intuitive eye and sensibility.


One such purist is Raag Clothing of India, founded by Textile and Fashion designer Asha Sarabhai who makes the most wonderful utilitarian housecoats with local Indian silk and cotton yarns.  Another is my current favourite designer Ian Batten a quiet genius, under rated and discreetly under the radar. 


It seems these two neighbours and local institutions of East Hampstead are quietly best friends and the pedestrian traffic strides gently, back and forth across the cobbled stones, between the gallery and the buttery.


Butter and Art.  How perfectly matched.