Welcome to The Priory Inn, September
This time of year evokes strong feelings of a new season awakening and our senses are fired up with different smells in the air, straw bales are ready for winter storage, the views across stubbled fields are again opened up and the hedgerows display their autumnal fruits. Whilst it should mark the culmination of the summer agricultural efforts, we are all too aware that the weather has not been kind for this year’s growing season – perhaps some precious September sunshine will raise the spirits, if not the level of harvest crops…
At The Priory Inn, we believe that businesses such as ours have a responsibility to support our local farms and producers in their hard times (as well as celebrate their bumper times) by ensuring that the local produce they grow and livestock they nurture is on your plates. There are, of course other benefits from buying food and drink locally: environmental reasons; additional flavour and nutritional value from eating fresh food which has barely travelled between field and plate; community spirit and insight learned from the relationships established; and an opportunity to convey this to people who want to enjoy good food and also want to know a little about the produce they are eating. Currently between 70-80% of our food is sourced within an approximate 30 mile radius. We are now attempting to restrict our buying area further by launching The Priory Inn’s “30 Mile Food Zone” this Autumn – more information will be with you soon.
Autumn is the real chef’s season – the local produce and opportunities for the menus creates a great buzz in our kitchen. Despite the weather, the local farms continue to provide rich offerings and our chefs are turning their minds to heartier, more robust dishes. We have mouth-watering local organic venison, and wild boar, autumn lamb and a multitude of earthy vegetables – wild mushrooms, crunchy carrots and cauliflowers, perfect potatoes and parsnips, beautiful beetroots and crisp cabbages. We are spoiled in this corner of England by the availability of game which is now coming back into season and our chefs continue to bake delicious bread, making great use of the wood-fired oven.
The wild boar on our autumn menu, come perhaps surprisingly from within 5 miles of The Priory Inn from “The Real Boar Company”. Farmed with limited intervention and exacting standards, the boars are of Polish and German origin and live within family groups called “sounders”. Within each sounder there is one boar and a number of females, each producing between 4-9 offspring. There is a dominant matriarch within each sounder who controls the breeding season – none of the others will come into season until she starts! The meat is delicious, tender and flavoursome and low in cholesterol, so a healthy option too. We hope you enjoy the local boar at our tables.
There is no better time of year to be 5 minutes away from the greatest natural firework display at Westonbirt Arboretum. It cannot be missed: become immersed in the Colour Circle, planted in the mid 1800s for holding annual champagne ‘colour parties’; breathe the air scented with mouth-watering caramel from the Katsura trees; admire the Persian Ironwoods and marvel at the kaleidoscope of colours provided by the maples, beeches, spindles and hickory.
We are very lucky to have some marvellous local art displayed on our walls. Recently we welcomed Tetbury artists Jusefa Charlamow and Marie Smith. Jusefa’s abstract oil canvases, inspired by land and tribal ancestry blend beautifully in the gastro-inn. In the coffee bar, you can indulge in Marie’s calming Maltese harbourside scenes, complementing the other talented local artists on display: Jacqueline Govier; Norma Crownshaw; Carole Condé; and, Nat Morley, all of whose work is for sale. Any other local artists are welcome to contact tanya@theprioryinn.co.uk if interested in displaying work.
Our coffee bar is due for an autumnal refresh this September and we know that you’ll enjoy the look given by the creative team at Flowercube in Stroud. Always inspiring, certainly never “normal”, we are constantly wowed by France Fenwick’s arrangements both in the coffee bar and reception. www.flowercube.co.uk
Don’t miss Sunday live music evenings here at The Priory Inn which provide great entertainment and a laid-back start to the week. This month we are delighted to welcome Steve Degutis (7th), Taylor and Williams (14th), Pigs Might Fly (21st) and Gren Bartley (28th). Ask any staff member to give you a full list of forthcoming singer/songwriters and more details are on the Priory Inn website at www.theprioryinn.co.uk.
“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower." Albert Camus
Click here for a full programme of Sunday night music at The Priory Inn.
TL Kelly 01/09/2008
