Consider if you will the much misunderstood practice of commercial food labelling. See if you can identify with this scenario. You’ve picked up a foodstuff in the supermarket, checked out the label and seen the words ‘Produced in the UK’ bought whatever it was and felt jolly pleased with yourself. I know I have.

However, your British pride might be slightly dented after I impart the following key piece of information.

Whatever it was you bought can legally claim to be made in this country as long as the ‘last significant change’ to that item happen on our shores.

So perhaps you bought sausages or chicken in breadcrumbs, or a ready meal with a picture of a farmer on the front.

Those sausages could well be made from cheap imported pork as long as they were turned into sausages here.

That chicken could be from lord only knows where, perhaps intensive poultry sheds in Brazil or Thailand (where an increasing amount of our imported chicken comes from) but as long as it was crumbed and packed here its ‘Produced in the UK’ status is totally legitimate – in the eyes of the law anyway.

As for that ready meal. EVERYTHING contained within could be from anywhere in the world as long as it’s ‘readiness’ was done here it’s OK to claim ‘Produced in the UK’

My Favourite however is ‘Wiltshire Cured Bacon’. That’s got to be bacon from Wiltshire right? WRONG. Wiltshire refers to the method of curing, not the lovely county. Cheap imported meat is being passed off as quality UK produce everywhere you look. Please don’t fall for it.

Farm, Park & Wild’s meat boxes, game boxes and seasonal ingredients are most definitely from the UK. Provenance is at the heart of everything we do and you will taste the difference.

Eat well and check the label, but even then think twice.

The finest Christmas Turkey needs the best streaky bacon and chipolatas. Cold Chrstmas Turkey on Boxing Day demands a great roast ham to make the perfect family day.

So we’ve put together three amazing free range pork meat boxes just for you this Christmas.

Farmed with care and attention by award winning pig farmer John Kenny (pictured on the right with Kent from Farm, Park & Wild) you’ll be very hard pushed to find better free range bacon, chipolatas, ham joints, sausages and fabulous pork pies anywhere. You certainly won’t find quality like this in any supermarket. We’ll even deliver your Christmas meat box direct to your door on either – 19th, 21st or 23rd December.

The meat boxes will be loaded on our site for sale on 27th November but for a sneak peak here’s the full list.

Free Range Christmas Ham, Bacon, Sausage & Pie Boxes  

Small Christmas Meat Box  
12 free range chipolatas  approx 450g 
12 free range streaky bacon rashers 12 rashers 
1 free range small ham joint  approx 500g (uncooked) 
2 free range pork pies standard size 170g 
£46.00
   
Medium Christmas Meat Box
24 free range chipolatas  approx 900g 
24 free range streaky bacon rashers 24 rashers 
1 free range medium ham joint approx 1kg (uncooked) 
4 free range pork pies standard size 170g 
£67.00
   
Large Christmas Meat Box
36 free range chipolatas approx 1.35kg 
36 free range streaky bacon rashers 36 rashers 
1 free range Large ham joint approx 1.2kg 
5 free range pork pies standard size 170g 
£92.00

Eat well and have a great Christmas.

Lets start with Jimmys Food Factory. Jimmy Doherty investigates what really goes into our supermarket food by setting up his own food factory to recreate processed ‘food’. This week saw Jimmy having a stab at square sandwich ham. You know the stuff ,that rather whiffy pre-pack nastiness masquerading as a pork product. Truth is it is made from pork, well mechanically reclaimed pork anyway with lots and lots of added water, flavouring and some lovely colouring. mmmmmmm. NOT!

Next up is an amazing TV series by Alex Riley, Britain’s Really Disgusting Food. Alex uncovers the nightmares of the British food industry. It’s a real eye opener. Like Jimmy’s programme the series investigates the difference between what’s on the label and what you are really eating.

On to better fare. We love Valentine Warner and his programme What To Eat Now. If like us you like eating seasonally and using sustainable ingredients then this is the show for you. Valentine clearly cares and is passionate about what he does and what he eats.

Farm, Park & Wild is committed to helping customers eating the Valentine way. We have some real issues with processed food, but by eating seasonally and really thinking about what we are eating we can address a whole host of issues – general health, sustainability and climate change for starters.

Farm, Park & Wild’s unique seasonal dinner party menu, our meat boxes, game & seafood boxes will help you on your way.

Eat well.

Apparently there is going to be a shortage of quality Christmas turkeys this year. Delve a little deeper into the story and we find that the source is Kelly’s Turkeys. Kelly’s are undoubtedly fabulous farmers and they have built an amazing business, however their Christmas turkeys are rather expensive - mmmmmmmm, wonder why this story hit the headlines in a recessionary year?

http://tinyurl.com/yadgbr6

Farm, Park & Wild’s TurkeyCam allows you too see our Christmas Turkeys live from the farm (during the hours of daylight anyway, the budget couldn’t run to infa-red technology). Please have a look and you can be confident in the provenance of your Christmas Turkey.

Jersey might be some distance from our North Norfolk home but we really like an idea from the Jersey Fisherman’s Association to label sustainably caught fish so customers know what they are buying. Why wouldn’t that happen?

Well it appears that the reason it’s not going ahead is because retailers won’t support the plan – shame on you we say! see the full story from the BBC here

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/jersey/8302740.stm

Farm Park & Wild fish are all line caught to promote sustainability and eliminate by-catch and our crabs and lobster are pot caught off the coast at Cromer by lifelong Cromer Crab fisherman John Lee – thats him on the right bringing his boat ashore through the morning mist.

Please join us on Facebook.

Pot-caught crabs from Cromer, fished from small boats using traditional methods, are smaller than most UK edible crabs. But because of the make up of the sea bed around Cromer these crabs are fatter and sweeter – Cromer Crabs are fabulous.

Unfortunatley the good name of the Cromer Crab has, we believe, been tarnished by, of all people, The Cromer Crab Company (part of the Findus Group).

If you go into a supermarket (try Waitrose for instance) you’ll find ‘Cromer Crab’ being sold at the fresh fish counter. All good you might think, but look a little closer. Next to the ‘plastic shells’ you’ll find a label informing you that the ‘region of origin’ is the ‘North Atlantic’.

The last time I looked Cromer was on the east coast of England and Cromer Crabs were fished from the North Sea. These supermarket Cromer Crabs are impostors, they are commercially fished, Atlantic crabs frozen at sea and shipped hundreds, or maybe thousands of miles to Cromer to be processed by the Cromer Crab Company and by doing so adopt the name of the town. It’s just our opinion but we think any product being sold as Cromer Crab should be from, well, Cromer.

Recent calls for the Cromer Crab name to be protected and thereby acknowledging the hard and dangerous work of Cromer’s fishermen can only be a good thing. You’ll find more information from the BBC by following this link.

http://tinyurl.com/mhrjld

Cromer Crabs are available from Farm, Park & Wild between April and Christmas if the weather allows

See our menu to order you Cromer Crabs, guaranteed fresh from the beach in Cromer and caught by Cromer Crab fisherman John Lee.

Farm, Park & Wild have a selection of great meat boxes and, in keeping with our ethos you can be assured of the provenence and quality of the cuts you are ordering.

Free range pork and chickens, grass only fed lamb, pot caught cromer crabs and lobster,  line caught fish, wild and park reared game whichever you choose you’ll get nothing but quality food.

We’ve split our quality meat boxes by small, medium and large boxes enough to feed two people or a whole family delivered fresh each week or month direct from the best farmers, fishermen, gamekeepers and food producers in North Norfolk.

To order your meat box please visit our menu and now our Christmas meat boxes are available from the Christmas Turkeys page or the main meat boxes page.

Eat well and have a very Happy Christmas.

Quite right too we say! Someone who keeps their own pigs made this wonderful comment – “People often say to me how on earth do you eat animals that you’ve raised? I reply: “How on earth could you eat an animal if you didn’t know how it had been raised?” And that’s exactly the point.

Knowing that the meat you’re serving has been raised with care ensures quality, that’s just a fact. Knowing that it has been raised with respect ensures peace of mind.

By ordering seasonal dinner party ingredients or meat boxes from Farm, Park & Wild you can be sure of the provenance of your food. All our farmers are passionate about what they do – care and respect for their animals is their, and our, number one priority. Here’s the link to the Sky News story.

http://tinyurl.com/myf3nn

Yeah, yeah you’ve heard it all before right! Jamie, Gordon, Hugh, Nigella, Rick they all say the same thing and whilst we wouldn’t argue with any of them, we know that most people do not have the time or perhaps, the skills to make the stocks and more importantly the sauces which we all know are the key to great tasting food.

So how do you cook great food
for your dinner party guests?

Farm, Park & Wild has the answer, we’ve made dinner party cooking easy

• Just choose the dishes you want to serve from our seasonal menu - mix and match if you like
• We’ll deliver all the freshest ingredients direct to your door from our quality farmers and fishermen in North Norfolk

PLUS we also deliver

• All the sauces and jus you’ll need, freshly made by our own resident Chef
• Plus simple step-by-step recipe cards

So, your next dinner party
will be a total success.

Give us a go. Simply visit our shop for our seasonal dinner party  menu, meat boxes and game boxes. We’ll be adding more meat, fish and produce over the course of 2010. If you have any questions whatsoever please call or email kent@farmparkwild.co.uk or jules@farmparkwild.co.uk

Happy cooking.

The practice of eating what is locally in season makes sense – no air miles, the support of local producers and enjoying the produce when nature decided it would be at its best. It can also mean less expense, which can offset the perceived cost of buying from independent producers. For instance local asparagus bought from a UK farmer’s market in July should be cheaper than air freighted out of season asparagus available in October from Peru.

The majority of the UK population grew up in urban areas, with little or no awareness of when and where various foods are produced. Imports from around the world ensure that supermarket shelves look the same week in week out. But with Chefs such as Valentine Warner and Gordon Ramsay advocating the seasonal approach and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall encouraging us to grow our own and increase our self sufficiency a renewed interest in what is seasonal and how produce is grown has emerged.

What has also emerged with the new culture of eating seasonally is an expansion of people’s food horizons. A nature of habit lovers that once viewed the parsnip as exotic the UK is gradually embracing previously alien tastes including kohlrabi (a relative of the Cabbage that can be grown anywhere), celeriac, and Globe artichokes.

And its not just fruit and vegetables that seasonality applies to. Whilst it’s common knowledge that Spring sees the best of the UK’s lamb many people still struggle to find information on seasonal fish. The Marine Stewardship Council (www.msc.org) is the definitive resource for certified fish and advises on where is best to buy MSC approved fish seasonally.

What’s in over Autumn and Winter

September, October and November
Meat and game
Autumn lamb, goose, partridge, wood pigeon, venison, grouse, guinea fowl, partridge, pheasant, rabbit and hare’

Fish and shellfish
Clams, cockles, crab, gurnard, haddock, John Dory, king scallops, lemon sole, lobster, mackerel, mussels, native oysters, pollack, red mullet, sardines, sea bass and sea bream

Vegetables
Beetroot, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, chard, courgettes, cucumber, garlic, kohlrabi, lettuce and salad leaves, marrow, field mushrooms, Jerusalem artichokes, onions, peppers, radish, rocket, potatoes, spinach, squash, sweetcorn, tomatoes and turnip

December, January and February
Meat and game
Duck, wild duck, goose, guinea fowl, hare, partridge, venison, wood pigeon, turkey, pheasant and rabbit

Fish and shellfish
Clams, cockles, crab, gurnard, haddock, John Dory, king scallops, lemon sole, lobster, mackerel, mussels, pike, pilchards, queen scallops, red mullet, sardines, sea bass and sea bream

Vegetables
Beetroot, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, celeriac, celery, chicory, Jerusalem artichokles, kale, leeks, potatoes, rocket and swede.