Tablehurst Farm has won the BBC Food & Farming Awards!

Tablehurst Farm is a 500 acre community farm and social enterprise founded in the mid 1990s. Producing meat, poultry, vegetables, raw milk and arable crops to biodynamic and organic standards, the core of the farm ethos is to involve the local community, inspiring others to think about how food is produced. The superb meat from Tablehurst has been a regular winner in the Soil Association Organic Food Awards and in recent years, Tablehurst has expanded its provision to include a wide range of really excellent vegetables and fruit and has been featured in the Daily Telegraph. The farm has a shop and a café garden and is a very popular venue for local families with children.

In addition, the farm runs a small residential care home for three adults with disabilities who live and work on the farm, and it also offers training for apprentices and students studying biodynamic agriculture.

Award Winning Biodynamic Farms

Plaw Hatch and Tablehurst farms are wonderful examples, not only of how earth-friendly sustainability can be realised, but how biodynamic agriculture it is a successful practical model of enduring resilience: over the years both farms have achieved awards for their practices and produce and are regular favourites for TV and news features.

The farms manage their land using a system of organic agriculture known as biodynamics. A biodynamic farm functions as a strong, self-sustaining, vibrant organism recognising and respecting the basic principles at work in nature. In the biodynamic system all the different components of the farm are seen as parts of a greater whole. The result is a self-contained, balanced, harmonious environment, with farm animals at the centre, that produces wholesome, nutritious tasty food.

Old Plaw Hatch Farm, a regular favourite of TV features, including Marcus Wareing’s (Michelin-starred chef and restaurateur) “Tales from the Kitchen Garden”, is a raw dairy, arable and stock farm and market garden south west of Forest Row, near Sharpthorne village. The land is largely owned by St Anthony’s Trust, with some additional land rented from private landowners. In the charming Farm Shop you can find wonderful raw milk, yoghurt, prize-winning cheeses, raw cream and the best-tasting eggs you can buy, all jostling for space with mouth-watering vibrant garden produce, flowers, preserves and freshly baked bread and pastries featuring mainly small, local producers. The coffee barn serving hot drinks and freshly baked cakes is open Tuesday to Saturday.

The farm has a milking herd of predominantly Meuse Rhine Issel (MRI) cows, with some cross Danish Red and Montbeliarde. Plaw Hatch is very special in not pasteurising its milk and people travel from many miles around to be able to buy raw milk, cream, yoghurts and cheeses. The 10-hectare market garden includes eleven polytunnels that allow year-round cultivation of a wide range of vegetables, salads and herbs grown from seed, as well as staple field crops and fruit, and cut flowers. 95% of what the farm and garden produces is sold through the busy Farm Shop. The farm also has a flock of heritage breed sheep (organically spun wool and sheepskins can be found in the shop), a beef herd, a small number of native breed pigs, and free ranging laying hens.

Plaw Hatch is actively involved in the education of future farmers, housing two apprentices, students on placement from Warmonderhof (a Biodynamic agricultural college in The Netherlands), and a host of volunteers and Woofers throughout the year. In summer, Steiner schools from across the UK visit for residential camping trips where they experience the work of the farm. Plaw Hatch provides homes for all of their farmers, gardeners, and their families.