Robert with David at Failand Hill farm

Failand Hill Farm

Wandering Ewe Dairy is located at Failand Hill Farm in North Somerset. It is run by Hugh and Pippa Stables. “Wandering Ewe” is designed to encapsulate our commitment to grazing and allowing animals to express their natural behaviours.

Farm

Their small group of dairy ewes and goats graze the fields of Failand – often surprising walkers with their friendliness. To ensure the milk for our cheese is the highest quality they spend the whole milking season on pasture consuming grasses, legumes, leaves and herbs. Milking and cheese making takes place between May and September.

All their animals raise their young to weaning and their farm is certified Animal Welfare Approved by agreenerworld.org.uk

Cheese

They produce delicious raw milk cheeses from the milk of their own sheep and goats. The cheese is hand made on-farm in Failand, using traditional methods. They make cheese every second day for the duration of the milking season. It is all matured on farm.

Wandering Ewe: Their original much loved mountain cheese. Pure sheep milk, with a natural rind. Matured slowly for a minimum of 9 months.

Wandering Two: The same recipe as Wandering Ewe, but with a mix of sheep and goat milk. A natural rind, matured slowly for a minimum of 9 months.

Thistle Tintern: Their newest cheese. Mixed sheep and goat. Inspired by the artisan Wensleydale revival in the Dales, this cheese is named after the Cistercian abbey – where they would likely have made a similar cheese many centuries ago before the cow became the dominant dairy animal in the British Isles. It is cloth bound with goat butter and made with home grown Cardoon thistle rennet. It is creamy with a pleasing acidity. Typically at its best between one and four months.

Crashing Boar Charcuterie

Charcuterie produced from their own pigs on a small high welfare dairy farm in North Somerset.

Their free-range ‘Iron Age Pigs’ are a similar breed to the Iberico pigs of Spain. They are Wild Boar crossed with Tamworth – one of Britain’s purest and oldest traditional breeds. This slow growing pig is very active, hardy and friendly.

Their pigs are raised in woodland and on pasture. They keep them in matriarchal family groups – weaning naturally at 6-9 months. They enjoy foraging for food, supplemented by a seasonally varied diet – whey from our sheep and goat milk cheese production, acorns, sweet chestnuts and apples gathered locally, as well as a British pea and bean mix. Growing pigs from whey produced by cheese making has been an integral part of farming for centuries. Crashing Boar pigs are certified Animal Welfare Approved by agreenerworld.org.uk .

Their recipes are deliberately traditional and simple, long cured without excessive salt, allowing the natural flavour of this exceptional product to shine through.

More on Iron Age Pigs

Joe Henson, the father of Adam Henson, developed the Iron Age pig in the 1970s for a BBC documentary about prehistoric living. He crossed a Tamworth sow (one of Britain’s purest and oldest traditional pig breeds) with a wild boar from London Zoo. The goal was to recreate an animal that looked and behaved like the early domesticated livestock of the Iron Age. One of the key features was young piglets with stripes.