Peterley Manor Farm

Peterley Farm was an important part of my childhood and it still is! Pick Your Own farms should be in everyone’s lives because it is so much fun and great value too. You feel like a hunter-​gatherer trotting along with a few plastic punnets in search of strawberries, raspberries, gooseberries, spinach, peas, carrots and many more. I am not condoning it but it is virtually inevitable: a significant proportion of delicious fruit doesn’t make it into the punnet and takes a little excursion towards your mouth. This is part of the fun. I distinctly remember us coming across a humongous duck-​shaped strawberry the size of my child-​sized fist and it being one of the most delicious things I’ve ever eaten. All the legally obtained fruit is weighed in the farm shop (for cheaper than at the supermarkets) and you can also buy a much wider range of organic fruit and veg, honeys, vinegars, bread and eggs, even organic freezer meals.
Next door is the garden centre brimming with flowers and hanging baskets. Now there the new summer Wild Strawberry Café in a charming yurt, decked out with higgledy piggledy chairs and tables, pots of herbs, mismatched crockery and a distinct Great British Bake Off feel. The food was excellent with a tasty lunch menu and an extensive range for brunch. We got a pulled pork burger, crab cakes and a courgette frittata, lemonade, elderflower cordial, and freshly pressed apple juice (with a range of different apples to choose from). The crowning glory of this meal was the meringue and passionfruit curd cake. I am going to go great efforts to attempt to replicate this cake because it was so good.