A Royal Visit to the Space Kitchen at River Cottage

Designing and equipping training kitchens is perhaps one of the more rewarding areas in which we work, creating spaces for the chefs of tomorrow to learn their craft from some of the best in the business.

The cookery school and training kitchen at Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall’s River Cottage was no exception and we thoroughly enjoyed working with Hugh and his team on the design project in 2013 after a fire had destroyed the original kitchen the previous spring.

We feel especially pleased that the work of all the staff and trainees at River Cottage has been recognised by royalty with Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, paying a visit to the Farm to tour around the kitchen and grounds last month during a special reception for River Cottage employees and local experts, where they presented Mr Fearnley-Whittingstall with a Duchy Nursery Manaccan plum tree to plant.

Charles and Camilla toured the grounds meeting head gardener, Will Livingstone and forager-in-chief John Wright before visiting the recently installed Space training facility where they watched young apprentices in the kitchen before dropping into the cookery class.

Sous-chef Chris Onions, teaching the class, said it was an honour to have the royal couple at River Cottage.

[su_quote ]I think it is wonderful that they made the effort to come down to the farm,[/su_quote]

[su_quote cite=”Mr Onions said”]The people taking the class were amazing, I was a bit nervous about it – filleting a fish with them looking over your shoulder is harder than Hell’s Kitchen.[/su_quote]

For more information about the royal visit see the full article in the Western Morning News