Celebrating & Preserving The Craft In Our Food Systems

In an age of algorithms and the spoon-feeding of screen-fed information, the analogue lifestyle and 'digital uncoupling’ have become counter-revolutions. We all agree that it is a modern tragedy that slow made craft and food has become novel in and of itself. Whether that is picking up a hobby and enjoying it in your own time at home, or dedicating the time and effort to mastery of a traditional craft. We are a significant leap from people spending fifteen years to perfecting a pork pie crust, honing butchery skill for ten years post-apprenticeship to become a master, or slogging it out in kitchens day and night to intuitively hone their tastebuds and cook on instinct. Earlier this year we saw The Taste of the West awards, champions of all things craft in the South West, collapse into administration. It’s amazing that we have got to this point, but here we are. Fortunately, Taste of the West has been brought back to life by a group of volunteers calling themselves 'The Consortium of People Who Care,' who are dedicated to championing the quality and legacy of food craft in the West Country.

At Field & Flower, we're also relentlessly dedicated to supporting the slow crafts and artisanal methods. We search high and low for those food producers and suppliers carrying on with traditional practices and slow craft, and we work as hard as we can to help their businesses find their way through these difficult times, and prosper on the other side. I have to admit, with each year it feels like the herd of artisans and craftspeople thins a little more, but for as long as we are here, we’ll be supporting farming communities and connecting them to people who care. See below for some examples of the craft that happens behind the scenes to make the magic happen.

Ben and our beef butchers seam out all of our beef by hand, and at Christmas, are kind enough to seek out marrow from big bones to enrich our Bone Marrow Rolled Sirloins. This is no mean feat, and I’m glad I can thank them quite publicly like this... thank you lads! Handling dry-aged beef is incredibly hands-on. When you receive your joint, have a look at the French trimmed bones, with parallel strings meticulously tied by hand, or lovingly faced up and squared off edges. These habits don’t just happen, they’re learnt from the butchers that taught you, just as my own butchery is a patchwork of skills of those that taught me. Special mentions go to Russel, Liam, Andre, Jakob, Joel, Paul, Martin, Nathan, Terry, John and JR, just to name a few. It’s in the work, side by side, through hours, days, weeks and months that you hone a craft and learn how to make something that ticks every box.

Alison and her team of makers and bakers do some of our trickiest Christmas products in their kitchens including hand raised and pressed pork pies, and lovingly cooked family pies. They have staff that have worked there for decades; they’ve known the pie presses and brat pans longer than they’ve known their adult children! Alison and Tracy also make a bespoke beef suet Christmas Pudding for us, and hand wrap them at their desks whenever they get a few spare minutes in the build up to Christmas. We’re going to put these online a bit earlier than the normal Christmas shop so you can get one before the festive season truly kicks off.

Cheese making is perhaps the finest example of the importance of time-honoured tradition, showing in the quality of the food it produces. There’s a fantastic YouTube series about Fen Farm available that you can watch in order to get psyched up about our Baron Bigods — I buy a 1kg wheel every Christmas. We’ve written all about how our mad scientist cheesemaker, Roger, comes up with his cheeses in this year’s HERD (the article starts with the line 'I'm addicted to making cheese'.) It's a good read and Roger was very excited to hear he was getting a two page article spread! He also has his own cheeseboard in our Christmas shop called Roger's Somerset Cheeseboard.

James, our co-founder, started Field & Flower with just one cow. Since then we've continued to support local and small as it's where we started. So the message I’d love to deliver to anybody who’s still reading is that this is the time when it really counts who you’re buying your food shop from. Seek out those producers who are making time to teach with their hands and pass on their craft to the next generation, and in turn keep our culture and local economy alive.

Use this Christmas to celebrate the slow and traditional artisanal craft of those in our communities, giving them an investment to continue to do it for generations to come. To help you do this, we currently have our Christmas offers available which ​end midnight tonight. So if you do fancy supporting our artisanal suppliers and farmers and buying your Christmas from Field & Flower, hopefully they will further persuade you.