There were probably a few moments in which chef Dan Cox questioned whether he’d bitten off more than he could chew at Crocadon Farm. Years spent in Michelin-starred kitchens including Simon Rogan's now-closed Fera at Claridges and L'Enclume, where he helped to establish its biodynamic farm, had certainly laid a solid foundation, but Dan is the first to admit that cultivating a 120-acre organic site is no mean feat. Six years on, though, he is enjoying the fruits of his labour. The farm, in Cornwall's St Mellion, is flourishing and Dan is opening his long-awaited debut restaurant Crocadon, which, housed in a historic barn at the heart of the farm, will be the culinary manifestation of his hyper-seasonal and self-sufficient ethos.
Over the last year, Crocadon has been painstakingly restored into a twenty-five-cover dining room and open kitchen, which is framed by the rolling hills of the Tamar Valley. But while it has dominated the last twelve months, the Crocadon project has been in motion for much longer. It was in 2017 that Dan – a Roux Scholarship winner – decided to fully immerse himself in organic farming, which ditches chemicals and relies instead on natural resources to benefit the whole food system, from people to plants. ‘I was heavily into the organic movement and trying to switch all of my supplies, but taking on the organic farm drew a line in the sand,’ Dan says. 'You can’t bring anything here that isn’t organic. I wanted to get a better understanding of the finer details around the farming and how these things come to be. I’m trying to build a farm and a model that really works within that ideal.'