PIPERS FARM/SUSTAINABLE MEAT COOKBOOK

How to eat ‘less but better’ sustainably produced meat via a seasonal flow, in harmony with nature and regenerative farming principles

This book is an aria for proper meat. Meat as it was before it got messed with. Before animals became a unit of production, but were reared to produce excellent food, and were willingly given an equally excellent life. 

It explores the connection between nature and farming and the result is a mixture of hands-in-the-earth farm stories and meat-first carcass balanced seasonal recipes. Meat is revered and stretched as far as we can make it go by respecting the animal and using every part, cheek to lard, tendon to tail. 

The recipes are not just meat and two veg, but provide cooking that is devised for the way we live today. Think a modernized version of warming farmhouse food, to suit the weather and our homes. Fast, fresh, surprising dishes for midweek, and slow-cooking or theater pieces shared with friends for weekends and holidays.

Far from countering the vegan spike, this is the definition of fair, honest, sustainable food. This is meat done right.

Pipers Farm is a farm in Devon which was founded as a reaction to the industrialization of meat in the 1970s and 80s. What started out as a farm and a small butchers' shop serving a loyal tribe of regular customers is now a thriving national online delivery service for truly artisan, sustainably produced British meat. The livestock is reared through regenerative farming techniques that work in harmony with nature, and this special place in Devon now counts over 40 like-minded small scale family farms as part of the Pipers Farm community. They are passionate about animal welfare, reducing food waste, rearing grass-fed native breeds and nourishing the land they work on, and ensuring that the rural communities they live and work with are given a sustainable future. It's all about family farms, not factory farms.

Pipers Farm was founded over 30 years ago by Peter and Henri Greig and today it is run by their son Will and his partner Abby Allen. Abby is a passionate food campaigner devoted to creating a positive future for small family farms through her ceaseless activity behind the scenes in the sustainable farming movement.

Rachel Lovell is a writer and producer dedicated to food and farming stories who has worked with the farm for many years, having spent much of her childhood on a small family farm in Devon struggling through the 1980s.