Ep. 1984 Peter and Henri Greig of Pipers Farm  | Wine, Food & Travel With Marc Millon

The Italian wine podcast is the community driven platform for Italian winegeeks around the world. Support the show by donating at italian wine podcast dot com. Donate five or more Euros, and we'll send you a copy of our latest book. My Italian Grapeake journal. Absolutely free. To get your free copy of my Italian GreatGeek journal, click support us at Italianpodcast dot com, or wherever you get your pods. Welcome to wine food and travel. With me, Mark Billen, on Italian wine podcast. Listen in as we journey to some of Italy's most beautiful places in the company of those who know them best. The families who grow grapes and make fabulous wines. Through their stories, we'll learn not just about their wines, but also about their ways of life, the local and regional foods and specialties that pair naturally with their wines, and the most beautiful places to visit. We have a wonderful journey of discovery ahead of us. And I hope you will join me. Welcome to wine food and travel with me, Mark Millen, on Italian wine podcast. Today, we traveled to to not very far from my home here in Devon, actually, to just north of me towards Columpton to meet my guests and very good friends, Peter and Henry Greg of Piper's farm. Piper's farm was founded by Peter and Henry in nineteen eighty nine with the aim of producing meat sustainably naturally, humanely, and in harmony with the environment. I've been a friend as well as a customer for more than twenty years. And over this period, we've had so many discussions about food and farming. We've both been involved in slow food, and we've traveled together to Italy to take part in Terra Madre. So it's great to meet up with you here this morning. And to be able to introduce you to Italian wine podcast listeners who are located all around the world. Thank you so much for being my guest today, Peter, and Henry. How are you both? We're very well. Mark, can I have to say it is a huge pleasure for us to join you today? Absolutely. And, Mark, may we say that Pipers found the Pipers Farm journey would never have been sustainable without the port of people who got what we were trying to do, and you have been right up there alongside us almost from the start. And so it's a great pleasure to be with you this morning. Well, it's a great pleasure for me, and I know our listeners will be fascinated to hear your story. I'm looking out my window this morning. Just at the moment, the sun is shining. It's pretty blustery, but it hasn't been an easy year for farmers so far, has it? You know, we had a a wonderful neighbor who sadly died. Although he was a good age, he was well into his eighties when he died last year. And he, like many people in farming, was like a sort of an oak tree or a rock, if you like, of wisdom, and he would very wisely say with each passing season. Well, of course, every year is different in farming, and you just have to learn to bend and adapt and respect the power of nature, as well as the beauty of nature, I think. That's a really nice way to start. Now talking about beauty, Peter and Henry, as I've said, our our listeners are located all around the world. So, Henry, could you please maybe describe this very special corner of Devon that is Piper's farm? So our listeners can get a vivid picture in their minds of this a very special place. As you said, we came here in nineteen eighty nine. We'd looked at eighty different farms before we landed here. We knew we needed to be somewhere where Farming was still a very important part of the landscape and small family farms, traditional family farms. So the area we're in is rolling hills and small fields and hedgerows, a lot of trees, and a lot of small traditional family farms. And that very much was what brought us here, what attracted us to come here. And since we've been here, you know, we've we've found it in the way that it's been found traditionally over generations And we realized the importance of the hedgerows. I mean, we knew that right from the beginning, and we fenced the whole farm so we could, you know, preserve the hedgerows for what they were, wildlife corridors, shelter for the stock in in inclement weather. And, the farm we love the farm, and I think the farm loves us. One of the special characteristics too is we're in this belt of old red sandstone. It's a wonderful deep red soil color. And when Henry, as Henry said, with our two small children, we will search itching for a farm to be the the base for Piper's farm, and we were living on Darkmore at the time. And whenever we drove through this belt of mid Devon, something just made our heart sort of sing a little bit. It's it's a wonderful backdrop to the landscape. This deep red Devon soil. Actually, that's a really good visual clue for our listeners because it is so distinctive. Our red Devon soil and the the way the, the landscape is carved as Henry said into a patchwork divided by these centuries old hedgerows that are such a haven for wildlife and biodiversity. Now, Peter, can you share with us, not the whole story, but briefly, the Piper's farm story. How you came to this this special corner, but more importantly, why, your motive for farming and your vision for what you've actually achieved. Well, Henry and I, when we were very first married, Farm, a high hill farm, in Wensleydale, in the north of England. And we were there six years, and nature was king. It was a very harsh physical environment, and it taught us to respect the power of nature and the importance of farming communities to support each other. We then went back to the small farm in Kent, south of London, where I had been brought up. My, mum and dad had pioneered industrial chicken production post war. And I worked with my father producing those chickens. And the thing about industrial livestock farming is you are effectively excluding nature from the system. And the contrast was very stark for us. But at the time, we had two small children. And what struck Henry and I was, first of all, we were producing food in this industrial chicken system, which we were not prepared to feed to our young children. Antibiotics were fundamental to that system to sustain it. And also, we felt as young farmers that we had a life ahead of us producing food. And at the very least, we wanted to be producing food, which we would confidently feed. To our children and therefore our customers. And the final piece of the jigsaw was when I was a little boy, all of the neighbors were small family farms. And by the mid eighties, they had gone from, you, Kent, that area closed for London. And so Henry and I sought to build Piper's farm in an area, whereas Henry said, family farms were still entrenched. They were still a fundamental part of the landscape, and that is what brought us to Devon to start the business of Piper's farm. Okay. So the this vision of small family farms lay at the heart of your idea for moving here. And you've then, very early on began to not only farm yourselves, but to work and create a network of farms, small family farms, as you've said, who share your same values and ideals. Tell us about how that that network sort of began and has evolved. We started here growing the livestock on the farm here, and we then had neighbors who were growing chickens for us and peeps for us. And that has gradually grown, as the business has grown. And we have a network now of fifty family farms, and they are farming in a way that their grandparents were farming. It is the very traditional farming in harmony with nature. And what Pipers provides is a route to market for those people. So they do what they do best. Which has farmed the piece of ground that has maybe been in the family for six generations, and they are farming that piece of land. And we are providing a route to market, doing all the things that You know, not everybody has the skill to do the processing, the customer service, the distribution, the marketing. So we have a team, and we have a digital platform who are doing all of those things so the farmers can continue to do what they do best, which is farm that landscape in harmony with nature. I I think Mark at the start, we had to rely on the goodwill of neighbors because thirty five years ago, when Henry and I had this very clear vision, it's fair to say there were not many in the farming community who could see what we wanted to achieve. And so we sort of said to our neighbors, please, would you grow some chickens or some pigs as Henry said? And I think they were kind because they did it out of friendship rather than a a an understanding or a conviction that this was going to be an important part of their farming future. Okay. That's really interesting to hear. Awesome will, and, his girlfriend, Abby, are running the business now. And we feel unbelievably grateful to them for carrying the torch forwards for Piper's farm. That is a very good example, Mark, of of what we deeply believe in, it is about giving the younger generation the opportunity to bring their energy their their enthusiasm, their absolute dedication, and commitment to what will has grown up with all his life. And they are bringing that to bear And growing Piper's farm so that it really can become a model that is a platform for a broader and broader section of society and also a platform on which more and more young people from many diverse interests, and it might be medics, it might be teachers It might be people who just deeply believe in producing amazing food. It might be young farmers, but all of them have the opportunity to be part of the growing Piper's Farm vision that Henry and I started, but as Henry says, we are incredibly grateful to Will and Abby that they are driving that platform and providing that opportunity for so many young people going forwards. And I think one of the things as well is You know, Peter and I had the skills to found the business, but to scale the business requires different skills and will and Abby have those. And that is really exciting for us to see them working with the talents that they have and taking the business forwards, you know, into a new place. Success is not easy. And we have many friends who are running their businesses and they haven't been fortunate enough to have succession. And although it isn't easy, it is so exciting to see it moving into a a new generation A new era. It's it's wonderful. Yes. And that that, emphasizes your belief in the younger generation, the next generation to continue carrying the torch So it's an inspirational story, and I'm so glad you've been able to share it with us. Thank you, Mark. Thank you. Italian wine podcast. If you think you love wine as much as we do, then give us a like and a follow. Anywhere you get your paws. Now, of course, Peter and Henry, I remember when you had a butcher shop in Magdalen Road in Exeter. The most beautiful butcher shop, the window display, the meat was always blade so immaculately. And Peter, you had actually taught yourself how to butcher yourself, being a farmer, but you then became a butcher and butchering in a different way to the British butchers. Yes. Uh-uh, an important landmark along the Piper's farm journey was when Henry and I were living in Kent producing industrial tick chickens is is a relatively part time job. And it did release me to have the time to go to Paris to the Paris show in nineteen eighty seven. And I was struck a by the vast scale of the food hall at the Paris show, and the farmers would spend two or three hours sitting down, eating, and drinking what they had produced. And with big banners displaying where they were from, there was a a deep pride in the culture of farming and food production. And in the evenings, I walked the streets of Paris and almost on every corner would be a bushery with the counter so beautifully presented where each plateful of meat looked like it was irresistibly tempting. And I came back to England in that same summer of nineteen eighty seven. And the agricultural show in this country was at at Stoney, and the Food Hall was Incredibly small. Nobody was sitting down. Everybody was eating, sort of curled up ham sandwiches. And that struck me the difference, but then I went over all over the country looking for a butcher's shop in England, which struck me in the same way as all of the shops in Paris. And honestly, Mark, I could not find a single one. And in that moment, I vowed I wanted to learn how to present meat in the way the French did. But, of course, when I asked in the the butchery profession in this country for someone to teach me, I got laughed at, to be honest. And so I said, okay. I will teach myself. And Henry and I, as Henry says, we were doing all the farming here. We were trying different breeds. We were trying different age. We were trying different lengths of hanging the meat and so on, but all with a frying pan beside us. So muscle by muscle, we would take carcasses apart, and we would be able to compare exactly a slice taken off the same muscle from animals, maybe who were a different age, or a different breed, or we had fed them differently. And what we were seeking to find was the connection between what we did on the farm and the eating sensation. Where was the joy of eating coming from? How could we achieve that on the farm? And so that system of butchery was ideal because it enabled us to do that and then feel confident we were presenting meat in a way which we felt the next generation of shoppers in this country would be excited to embrace rather more than the post war generation who had been, you know, very happy with the the much more traditional English style of butchery. That's really fascinating. And I think it's very important, that you began, making that link between the meat you were producing and the flavor sensations, that link between flavor and goodness. And the different cuts, how different cuts, slow cooking cuts, as opposed to the prime premium steaks, you know, how they can give so much pleasure as well. And I think that link between pleasure and food is why the slow food connection has been very important. We'll talk about that in just a minute. But I briefly would like to discuss The Devon Red Ruby, because when I think of Piper's farm, I first of all think about this native breed of cattle, which you have championed for so many years, which is one of slow food foundation for biodiversity, ark of tastes breeds, and Piper's farm is in fact a slow food, ark of taste producer. Can you tell us briefly about this very special native breed of cattle? So the paddle are the most amazing chestnut color. They're not very big. They are bred on the top of Xmoor, which is, you know, it is high, it is steep valleys, it is moorland. And we were walking up there this week, in fact. And, I mean, it is amazing because it's it's a beautiful landscape. It is a tough environment, and the grasses are really tough, and yet these cattle can thrive up there, and their mothers can, the you know, the cows can convert this really tough grass into moorland grass into mother's milk for their calves. This landscape could not be doing anything else you could not grow any other crops up there, but the cows can produce the most amazing milk and, rear their calves up there. And we felt it was really good that we were using meat from those cattle. They're not very big. They're fine grained, and it means they're really good eating quality for, for customers. For our customers, they're not sort of ideal for catering, but they're perfect for family eating. Mark, as Henry says, we were up there, a couple of days ago, interestingly, with two medical students who have been with us this week from Bristol University. And the reason they have been here is because we have, engaged with the university and said to them, we are very surprised that in a six year medical degree, you spend one afternoon talking about nutrition. And they said, okay. We would be very happy if you would take the opportunity to introduce some of our third year students to what your perspective, if you like, on the future of health, instead of medication, we are saying, the closer you are to nature, the more likely you are to improve health and well-being of humans. And so we were up there with these two students, and as Henry says, walking through the landscape, showing them some of the many farms, the many family farms up on the top of Xmoor, who have reared bread, red ruby's forests in some cases for more than thirty years. But it was helping those students to understand. Those native breeds of cattle are indigenous in these rugged landscapes, and there are native breeds all over the UK. There are highland and there are hereford and there are Angus and there are Lincoln and there are Lincoln and there are Sussex, but these are breeds of cattle who would flourish and thrive in nature's rough landscapes before the food system was industrialized. So this is food built from the soil, and the red ruby is really the perfect example for us to share with our customers of Piper's farm is trying to produce food, which truly is born and bred and nourished out of the soil and the landscape. For really, for us, right from the early stages of Piper's farm, the red ruby was the perfect example of a an animal absorbing all of the richness of the landscape in which they are an integral part. They are indigenous to this landscape, and the red ruby is really being built out of the the true richness of this incredible Devon landscape, and that is the the building block of food which we believe delivers really great pleasure for our customers, but also very importantly, really honest nutritional value. From that close connection between the animal and the soil. That's a really good description of this small, tough breed. And also, Peter and Henry, giving this, vision of Exmoor, which many of our listeners may not know, this rugged, more land landscape. As you know, I'll be cycling over that on the thirtieth of June. It's the twenty fifth Nellocycle, and we always cycle over the roof of Xmoor. And it can be such an inhospitable environment even in mid summer. I think we gain an image of this this resilient animal that can deliver such fantastic meat. Peter, you mentioned the medical students. I know, that you've brought to Piper's farm, and I know you've brought many other students to Piper's farm. I've brought groups of students to you over the years. And that's always been a really fascinating visit. Education and, communication of what you're doing has always been very much a part of of your vision. Yeah. And and it has been particularly interesting for Henry and I in the discussions we've had this week with these medics. So We were drawing parallels between the path that the medical profession has gone down over the last thirty, forty, fifty years and the similarity with the past that the farming industry in the developed world, so called developed world, has gone down. And this is a path of increasing intervention of high input of developing genetics in in the case of farming that require the input of of feed stuffs and agrochemicals. It's a very intensive, world, and and the medical world, and these students exemplified it. It's all about What drugs do you use to cure disease? And what we've been saying is in both cases, we believe the future is about going back to a pre industrial age when human beings lived as part of nature. We are part of nature, and there is so much to be gained by respecting nature and harnessing the power, the gifts of nature are enormous, and we, in all honesty, are only just beginning to scratch the surface of understanding its power and how much it can give us how much we as a species can benefit from living in harmony with it, and we believe passionately that we need the younger and young guest generations coming on now. To take this very different view of where they are going to go of what the future looks like because we need to learn the lessons. Of the last fifty years, it is completely unsustainable, either in farming to industrialize the system and exclude nature or in medicine to again shun the power of the body in harmony with nature to do much to heal itself or to help prevent many of the diseases that are now so embedded in in our society. So education for us massively important. Okay. Now Henry, we first met, through our mutual involvement, and this is lies, with this subject of education through our mutual involvement with slow food Devon, our local Convivian, of the international Italian founded and now global slow food movement. What is it that attracted you to the ideals of the slow food movement? We were very much attracted because it it it aligned very closely with the way that we were looking at food and food production and the quality of the food that we were producing and the way that we were producing. And of, I mean, fair, a fair price for the people who are producing that food. And that is one of the things that I think has been very special about Pampers Farm is we can provide a route to market for our customers. We can pay them a fair price because it literally is the farmer. Hyper's farm as the processor the route to market and our customer. There is a very short supply chain, and, we are all very closely connected. And the wonderful thing I feel is that It means that, farms like the farms in Devon, they're not very big, but by because they are, supplying Piper's farm, They are able to earn an income offered relatively small piece of land. So much of the time when we come out of Devon, people say farming has got to be big. It's got to be on a big scale, you know, you cannot operate on a small scale. Piper's farm has proven over all these years. You can operate on a small scale. If you have a very short supply chain, and a very close route to market between the farm and the customer. And to sing about the digital platform, which, again, we just feel is really exciting. We have Instagram. Our farmers, they can see. They can they can look on Instagram. They can see customers who are going. I have just bought this pork belly. I'm going to cook it in this way. I'm gonna marinate it like this. And then they'll show the photograph of the finished article. And our farmers can go, that was my talk. I grew that, and somebody is appreciating that. Whereas if they're selling into the mainstream, They have no idea where it goes. What appreciation the person who is eating it has felt about the hard work that they have done. And I think that is one of the things that we feel so strongly about slow food. It is sustaining and encouraging these traditional ways of growing food. So this is one of the things we feel so strongly about slow food. Slow food is all about nurturing and encouraging these traditional methods of food production globally. And one of the amazing moments when we went to Terramadre is seeing these amazing foods, these special foods grown in their specific locations, and the flavors that you get from that And I think that is one of the things that we feel very strongly. We were keen to support, the slow food movement. And and, Mark, if I could just add a little to that, I think it is this, acknowledgement that people are a very, very important, component of a sustainable food system. Those communities. And for Piper's farm, that has always mattered enormously to us. When we say we want to sustain family farms, It's because of the multiple generations. It's because of the mix of the maybe the the, men and the women within the farming family. It it really is sustainable because farming can be tough. And you really need a sort of commitment and the the passion and the real it's a way of life where you need to put your heart and soul if you like into producing food that is really going to have value and equality for your customers, and yet We believe the the mainstream global commodity system of food production. These people feel unappreciated, they're undervalued. As Henry says, They don't get the nourishment of knowing that all their hard work has resulted in food that people have enjoyed. And it becomes a sort of hamster wheel, really, if they're being push to do more and more go faster and faster, and Piper's farm absolutely is the opposite of that. We're saying, we value and respect the traditional ways in which you and your forefathers have produced food, and we want to help to sustain that. Yes. I think that encapsulates why, Carlo Petrini's message of food that is good, clean, and fair is very much at the heart of Piper's farm as well. Henry Mocho is called wine food and travel, so I'd like briefly to touch on wine. I know it's it's not a subject that is at the heart of Piper's farm, but we've shared many a glass of wine together. And yesterday, we were discussing a meal that I'm planning on bringing a group to you where we sat around the fire pits. And isn't it amazing that we can now discuss including our own range of Devon wines to serve alongside Devon Foods, really fabulous sparkling wines, zesty whites, big forceful reds. It's it's such a change that we've seen over the last two decades. Yes. Mark, I I was really lovely talking to you and it I'm always learning when I speak to you about wine. I think one of the things that, came over yesterday is that we've got some fabulous young winemakers in the region, in the southwest. And that is very, very exciting. You were also talking about vineyards areas now in the UK where wine is being grown in a way that it has never been grown before, but It is possible. And and areas of England and Wales are becoming specialist in Finyards growing wine, and then these wonderful young winemakers. Yes. It is. It's quite inspiring and and quite wonderful to be able to pair a menu as we were discussing with the local drinks. Yes. Peter, finally, the achievements of Piper's farm and all that you and Henry and your team and the farms you've long worked with been recognized by numerous awards including a lifetime achievement award from the Addington Fund Devon business awards at the recent Devon County Show. That award cited your lifelong commitment to advocating our fairer, cleaner, farming supply chain, What is your message and your vision for the future of food and our food system? Firstly, Mark, it was actually a very emotional moment receiving that award, not least because It did have my name on it, but I was obviously thrilled that it was Henry and I who both went up to collect that award. And I think it's been a hugely challenging journey for Henry and I, but we get a real thrill from feeling very positive about the future just as we did as young people, we had a vision about how we felt the food system could really be changed for the better, could feel very positive. And Piper's farm is all about encouraging the younger generation to feel that sense of optimism and that sense of great privilege to work with nature. And so we see the future landscape being populated by a rich mix of young people with different skills because it is a digital age. Now many youngsters who maybe have an aptitude for education, or for health care can all become embedded can all collaborate with the next generation of farmers who truly are committed to working in harmony with nature. And so the richness of this tapestry, this collaboration is something that Henry and I feel very optimistic about, and that award ceremony was recognizing a a number of young people who were proving themselves right up for the challenge, and they have the the sort of energy that Henry and I had thirty years ago, but We are so excited about the opportunities that they have to really take those principles of slow food. The incredible magic of Carlo Petrina's vision, and take it and grow it and nurture it so that the next generation of food system globally is really going to be something much more closely aligned with nature than it has been in the the recent past decades. And Mark, I I am very excited because at the moment, I'm working with the Devon's sustainable food partnership. And that is a group of different stakeholders which includes the county, the university, the public health, climate emergency. Everybody has now understood in Devon, where part of sustainable food places, Devon is a sustainable food county. And we are they are all recognizing now the interconnectedness of food, farming, landscape, public health, which is something that Peter and I have believed in for such a long time, and it is so exciting that Devon is believing in this too now, and we have a fantastic leader who is leading us in this. In this partnership. Well, that's a that's wonderful to hear both of you so optimistic about the future based on, more than three decades of of hard work to establish what you have created. It's always such an inspiration to speak with you both, and I'd like to urge our listeners wherever they are in the world to look at the Piper's farm website because although you are supplying meat throughout the UK online, for people elsewhere, there there is a wealth of knowledge and information on the website that I'm sure people will find of great interest. Peter and Henry, I look forward very soon to being at Piper's farm again to sitting around your fire pits on hay bales to eating and enjoying and learning. So Thank you both so much for being my guest today, and I look forward to seeing you soon. Thank you, Mark. Thank you, Mark. It's been a great pleasure. Thank you. We hope you enjoyed today's episode of wine, food, and travel. With me, Mark Minen, on Italian wine podcast. Please remember to like, share, and subscribe right here, or wherever you get your pods. Likewise, you can visit us at Italianwine podcast dot com. Until next time.