Inside Cornwall's newest Michelin star restaurant that reinvented the Sunday lunch

A Cornish farm restaurant has been awarded a coveted Michelin star for its incredible food – an award that we saw coming as we knew it was special from our first visit.

Crocadon Farm won the star for its originality and “wonderfully pure” flavours. Crocadon, at St Mellion near Saltash, is a “field to fork” restaurant serving dishes brought to life from its very own 120-acre farmland. Now the restaurant, the brainchild of Dan Cox, is one of just four across Cornwall to hold the guide’s prestigious accolade after it was awarded on Monday, February 5, an award which comes just a year after it was given a rare Michelin green star.

CornwallLive visited the top eatery in February 2023 and reviewer L J Trewhela wisely wrote: “Watch as it rapidly becomes one of Cornwall’s places to be.” Read his full review below.

Crocadon Farm is the brainchild of Dan Cox, who has worked at the celebrated L’Enclume and Aulis in the Lake District, was executive chef at Fera within Claridges, and has held other chef roles everywhere from Mayfair to Catalonia. In 2008 he was crowned winner of the prestigious Roux Scholarship.

It’s fair to say Dan knows his onions and – judging from our visit during Crocadon’s opening weekend – his carrots, squash, artichokes and just about every other vegetable and herb you can mention too.

The restaurant is based on the 120-acre organic farm of the same name on the outskirts of St Mellion, meaning it’s dangerously near Devon but 11 miles within the border to still proudly boast its Cornishness. Dan has cultivated the farm over the past five years and now the restaurant has opened has passed the farming reins to husband and wife duo Tim Williams and Claire Hannington-Williams.

A chef preparing food

The ethos of the Crocadon menu is to use the breadth of the regenerative ingredients Dan has cultivated since taking over the land and bringing new life to the soil. Basically everything you eat here (bar the fish, shellfish and mushrooms) is grown or farmed in the fields around you, including rare and heritage breeds of sheep and cattle.

There’s even an on-site microbrewery and pottery. Alongside head chef Michael Thompson, Dan handcrafts all of the tableware for the dining room. Clever sods.

This may all sound a bit right-on and offputting when you just want a good night/afternoon out, but Crocadon seems to have got the balance right – not too Shoreditch-by-the-sea hipster to put off the no-nonsense Cornish and not too snooty and fine-dining to make it a staid experience.

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It’s so relaxing you’ll almost want to doze off as soon as you arrive thanks to the sheepskin covers on the chairs and the 25-cover dining room’s wood burner. It’s cosy and belies the historic stone barn’s previous life as a crumbling shell.

Dan and his team in the open kitchen, and the waiting staff led by Cat Kirkwood – previously manager of Amass in Copenhagen – are welcoming, friendly and are keen to tell you about the farm. The adventurous dishes are heightened by the staff’s explanation of exactly what you’re eating and why. If you want your Sunday lunch plonked down in front of you with no interaction and no messing, then head to your local carvery, but if you want a different sort of experience head to Crocadon.

Inside Crocadon’s restaurant

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In the evening, there’s the choice of two tasting menus – a long (£95) and shorter (£65) version, with the more relaxed sharing-style “feast” on Sundays. Billed as a three-course menu, what you actually get is six courses divided into three parts – that £45 starts to feel a little more reasonable.

Full disclosure here – CornwallLive was invited to eat by Dan and his team. On the strength of Crocadon’s unique dining experience and the ingenious mix of flavours – some of which blew my tiny little tastebuds – I’d be tempted to pay that £45 on a weekly basis if only I lived closer.

A small plate of food

The meal started with a sourdough cracker topped with cheese curd and carrots from the farm, which were grilled over charcoals and dressed with carrot juice and marigold oil, topped with chervil and parsley. The restaurant makes a whole range of oils to bring the farm’s herbs to life throughout the year. Has a carrot ever tasted so good? The fresh flavours remain long after the cracker’s gone in a mouthful.

Next up was wrasse – not a fish you often find on a British menu, mainly because it ends up like cotton wool when cooked. A colourful fish which resembles coi karp, wrasse is usually thrown back into the sea by Cornish fishermen, but it’s highly revered in Japan for sashimi and that’s what Dan’s doing here. Dry aged for a week, sliced with an apple juice reduction and fennel oil, it’s served raw with two different types of winter radish; piquant and those not sure about raw fish will take to its subtle flavour.

Something a bit more traditional ‘Sunday lunch’ next, though still a million miles away from granny’s over-boiled cabbage. Beef from the farm’s (late, departed … obviously) ten-year-old Aberdeen Angus suckler cow has been aged for 132 days; skirt and other braising cuts were then broken down and bound together with beef sauce. Covered in breadcrumbs and served with a miso mayonnaise and fermented pickled cucumbers, the results are perfect little cubes of delicate beef. Immense.

The three starters were then followed by the main – sheep, though for my mutton/lamb hating wife, some mega beefy mushrooms courtesy of Mushroom Mic from Dart Valley Fungi over the border.

A plate of sheep flllet

The sheep fillet is served in a dish of haricot beans, with little chunks of braised shoulder, crispy lamb belly and pickled Hungarian wax pepper with grilled fermented courgette. A hefty little number, akin to one of the finest stews you will ever savour, it’s served with roasted squash topped with a squash seed and chilli crumb, roasted Jersusalem artichokes with a green mustard sauce and lightly torched fermented cabbage with a miso sauce.

Big bold flavours and with the miso-topped cabbage, a sharp but creamy umami experience my tongue has never known before. This is Sunday lunch, Jim, but not as we know it.

By now, the Tamar Valley restaurant was filling up with locals from Plymouth and nearer to home eager to see what this new kid on the farm was all about – a good mix of retired couples, a likely first date and even a walker with her dog and a book.

Inside a restaurant

A cheeky little pre-dessert followed – an apple and sweet clover custard surrounding a fermented celeriac ice cream with celeriac skin caramel on top and a sweet celeriac crisp. Celeriac as a pud? Is this Dan geezer mad? It was beautiful. With some sort of magic, the chef had created a dish where a root vegetable had the sweet hit of pineapple or mango.

Incredibly there was one more dish – a caramel tart made from whey with a whey caramel custard, caramelised apple puree, yoghurt, finished with shards of fresh apple and sorrel. Like every dish here, while being absolutely delicious it feels like you’re actually doing your body some good. I’ve never consumed so many vegetables in one meal.

Crocadon Farm has reinvented Sunday lunch and it’s amazing. For more details see the website.