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THE NURSE'S COTTAGE HOPES TO BRING HOME THE BACON

October 2009

Bring home the bacon!
That’s the challenge The Nurse’s Cottage proprietor Tony Barnfield is giving local farmers.
He has teamed up with the Daily Echo and Transition Towns campaign to find a local bacon supplier for his restaurant with rooms in Sway.
Tony, who opened The Nurse’s Cottage in 1992, has always been a keen supporter of local food, using it wherever possible.
He was also involved in setting up the New Forest Marque, which guarantees that at least 25 per cent of the ingredients in a product were grown or reared on the New Forest.
But he has yet to find a local supplier who can supply the bacon he wants for his award-winning breakfasts, instead importing the thick, rindless back bacon from Holland.
“I want to find something locally that’s just as good,” he says.
Tony believes that it’s important for restaurateurs and hoteliers to work with local producers to find ways to get their food onto their menus.
He was keen for a local supplier to provide the small jars of jam he serves with breakfast. But while he could buy a jar of jam from a national company for around 14p, for a small local producer, just the empty glass jar cost around 17p, meaning they couldn’t compete.
But Tony was determined and came up with the idea of collecting the little jars of jam rather than recycling them and giving them to a local producer to sterilise and fill for him.
“I believe restaurants have to get involved in how a product is made,” he says.
“We had to do this, otherwise it wouldn’t exist. It’s important to find ways to make using local produce work.”
The Nurse’s Cottage – which is both guest accommodation and a restaurant – has won numerous awards. Tony and head chef Nick Elliott are both clear that quality comes first followed by being able to source locally and finally cost.
“What we sell on first is quality so we wouldn’t use a local product which is inferior to one we can get elsewhere but wherever we can we use local produce.”
Among the local food on the menu at the Nurse’s Cottage are free range eggs from Noah’s Ark Farm in New Milton, jam and marmalade from Perfect Preserves in Lymington, flour from Eling Tide Mill and Cotton’s Craft Bakery in Bitterne Park and wine from Marlings Vineyard in Sway. A range of local produce is also sold in their shop.
And today he is launching a special Eat Local Wednesdays set menu.
As well as the range of local food already on the menu, every Wednesday there is a special three course set menu consisting entirely of local dishes.
Tony and his team work hard to provide a great service to hotel guests and diners while constantly seeking out more sources of high quality local food.
It’s ironic, then, that when the former radio presenter and producer bought the old district nurse’s house in the New Forest it was with a view to slowing down. “I never thought I’d run a business here,” he laughs, but it’s clear that he’s very glad he did.

By Sally Churchward, Southern Daily Echo

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