human head. Within hours, it would be
transformed into the best version of itself,
bearing the wood-fired oven’s char, the
fragrance of thyme and garlic, and the glow of
golden butter. It was an expression of Cornwall
itself—unexpected, unfussy and gorgeous.
Bloomfield and Adams aren’t the only
outsiders to realize the fertile promise of
Cornwall. Some of Britain’s most inventive
young chefs and entrepreneurs are settling
here and finding inspiration in the region’s
traditions. Together with farmers and
fishermen who trace their roots back
generations, they are sparking a profound
confidence in the bounty of this land. What’s
old is new again—and it tastes phenomenal.B
efore meeting Bloomfield and Adams,
my husband, Tristan and I spent three
days hiking 49 kilometers of
Cornwall’s South West Coast Path,
from Boscastle to Padstow. The poet John
Betjeman, who spent much of his life in
Cornwall, described Boscastle as being set in
“half a mile of winding, gloomy chasm where
overwhelming cliffs of shale and slate are
parted by tidal water a stone’s throw across.”
In the sunshine, the fishing village sparkled.
But when it rains, the terrain can be tragic;
in 2004, a flash flood washed away much of
the village.
From Boscastle, the path traverses slope
after seaside slope, some so steep that we
ascended and descended by earthen staircase.
Gulls squawked but kept their distance, much
as the locals did. Everywhere we went, they
were welcoming but reserved, embodying the
ambivalence that the Cornish have about
outsiders. Legend has it that when Saint Piran,
now Cornwall’s patron saint, arrived, having
floated on a millstone across the Irish Sea, his
first converts weren’t people—they were a
badger, a fox and a boar.
It’s easy to see why outsiders still come to
this fat finger of land, which points from
Britain’s southwesternmost corner across the
Atlantic. Though Cornwall is England’s poorest
county, it may be its richest in heritage and
beauty. Every hill on our hike brought newvistas, every bend a different field—this one
framed by an ancient stone wall, that one filled
w it h golden rapeseed blossoms. Just as
abundant: the stories, stretching back
centuries. In Trethevy, we sat for a few silent
minutes in a 14th-century chapel dedicated to
Saint Piran that had languished as a farm
outbuilding until its restoration in the 1940s. In
Tintagel, we clambered amid the cliff-top
rem na nts of what’s sa id to be K ing A r t hur’s
castle—a history buff ’s dream, a health-and-
safety officer’s horror. In several places, we
marveled at gravity-defying seaside towers of
slate, souvenirs of Cornwall’s quarrying days.
Even our primary sustenance as we
walked—savory hand pies, called pasties, that
we had bought in each tow n—spoke of
Cornwall’s past. Once, the miners took these
thick pastries, filled with beef, potatoes and
onions, down into the tin and copper mines as a
practical, all-in-one meal. Their wives and
mothers would carve the miners’ initials on a
corner of the crust for identification purposes.
The cr imped, cur ved edge of t hick dough
served as a handle, so the rest of the pasty was
spared contamination from the filth on the
miners’ hands. Corner and crust also doubled
as an insurance policy: once discarded, the
remnants were said to be scavenged by
knockers, elflike creatures believed to inhabit
the mines. Amid danger—say, a gas leak—the
knockers would know, by those initials, to
rescue the miners who’d fed them. (For a lesson
on Cornwall’s mining past and shots of its
dramatic cliffs, watch the series Poldark.)
A few kilometers past Trebarwith Strand,
we passed a flock of sheep grazing in a cliff-top
pasture. I confessed to my husband I was
thinking about mutton stew and lamb chops.
He chided me. “What are you thinking about?”
I asked him. He smiled sheepishly (sorry, not
sorry) and then replied: “Sweaters. And
sheepskin-covered seating.”
Though tour ists t hrong Por t Isa ac, t he
setting for the TV show Doc Martin, and
Padstow, a foodie destination, we encountered
other hikers only occasionally. As we descended
into one narrow valley, an elderly couple
negotiated the opposite slope. Upon drawing‘There’s a CHARM in something UNREFINED. We want to
create a place that not only fills THE STOMACH
but also lowers BLOOD PRESSURE and makes guests
FEEL AT HOME. We want Coombeshead to be WHOLESOME’
108 MAY 2017 / TRAVELANDLEISUREASIA.COM