Autumn into winter

Saturday was a rare sunny day amongst the misty, murky days of recent weeks. The bright tints of late autumn were so attractive that I am posting a small photo gallery, just for the pleasure of it.

The few remaining leaves show up brightly against the nearly-bare branches.




In the hedgerows there are still a few beech leaves also providing colour.

On some branches the yellow and orange of lichen gives another bright note.

Lichen and late leaves

Turn and look the other way and winter seems well-established....

Not a leaf to be seen!

....although a gentle haze on the nut trees show where the catkins have been in place for some time.


At the back of the shed the 'bug hotel' is standing up well to wind and weather.

Has anyone told the bugs they can move in?

Two young trees are ready to be planted and will go in partly as pollinators for the Kent Cobs (which as we know are not self-fertile), and to add to the pollination provided by wild hazels around the plat.

These young trees are a variety called Cosford filberts

Wanding in the top bloc is well underway and, as tomorrow is the first of December I shall spend a hour or two on the young bloc - weather permitting!

Visit to Hurstwood Farm

In Mid November a group of us met at Hurstwood Farm for a visit to see how Kentish Cobnut Oil is made.

Cobnut trees make the backdrop as the group assembles

Our host, nut farmer (and piano-maker), Richard Dain received us warmly with tea and biscuits and he and his assistant, Catherine, gave a talk explaining how it all came about.

Cathrine, right, explains 

When his extensive apple orchards suffered irreparable damage during the Great Storm of October 1987 Mr Dain decided a wiser move would be to replant with cobnuts rather than with apples.  The idea for an oil press came later and, being an engineer by profession, he assembled the various parts, sourcing from Italy, Germany and using his own invention.

The barn where we sat doubles as a concert hall in summer

The resulting cobnut oil was entered for the Great Taste Awards of the Guild of Fine Food and at its first appearance won not just best in its category but overall winner. It was a great start and Kentish Cobnut Oil has gone from strength to strength since then.

Making oil from cobnuts is not simply a question of feeding the nuts into a machine and bottling the oil that comes out.  The process has many stages and we visited each in turn. First we saw the machine which makes boxes into which the bottles are packed for dispatch: different sizes for different numbers of bottles.

The machine will print boxes to suit your specifications

But before any of that what about the actual process of making the oil? First the nuts must be dried and the moisture reduced to a particular degree. Then the nuts are cracked and the shells separated from the kernels.  The kernels are fed into a hopper and thence into the pressing mechanism.

Nut kernals are drawn up the conveyor (right) into the hopper

Richard Dain controls the pressing mechanism

The resulting oil goes into containers and thence to the bottling plant.

Three bottles are filled before you can say 'nuts'!

There is another element of this machine which secures the bottles with sealed caps.

Securing the familiar and distinctive labels

 Finally the bottles are labelled and are ready to be packed into their boxes.










Hurstwood farm has thirty acres of cobnuts and another seven acres of walnut trees which will be made into walnut oil once the necessary machinery has been installed.  I think we would be willing guinea-pigs when it comes to  trialling it!


You can buy Kentish cobnut Oil from Hurstwood Farm at the Shipbourne Farmers Market
(Thursdays from 9 to 11 am).

I too have supplies and will be happy to take your orders: 

just phone 01732 761466