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Monday 16th October 2017

Our Zero Waste Holiday

 

Autumn is upon us and we are welcoming the warm cinnamon infused drinks, crisp mornings and hearty stews with open arms. This season seems to slow us all down, and rightly so after an energetic, outdoor summer that’s blessed us with longer days and shorter nights. With these slower days brings a time to reflect; reflecting on our first summer in Devon and our first summer of running the shop! What an adventure, eh?! It has been full and fulfilling in every sense of the word. We can happily say that we’ve (successfully?) juggled running a business and soaking up family time simultaneously. With that said, we were in need of a break; a break from emails, orders, spreadsheets and phone calls. We needed to disconnect, to reconnect to each other, nature and ourselves.

The place we found to stay was the perfect place to have a zero waste holiday (which so happened to be during zero waste week!). We stayed in a converted horsebox that was nestled amongst the trees on a working organic farm, near St. Agnes, Cornwall.

We packed up the car with essentials; cacao powder, pumpkin seeds, nut butter, rice...(ok, I wanted to take my whole pantry but I chose the essentials in the end!). That’s the beauty of a stay-cation, you can fill up your car with all your home comforts, which in our case is organic, packaging free food.

On arrival we were welcomed with a box of vegan, gluten-free chocolate cakes that were locally made (and in a paper box!). Over the course of our stay there we were able to pick any food we liked from the grounds of the farm; blueberries, blackberries, cucumbers, tomatoes, aubergines, lettuce, carrots…it was the zero waste dream!!

      

The feeling of eating food that you picked just moments before with your own hands is priceless; it connects me to the earth and its energies. It makes you slow down when you cook and when you eat, savoring the texture, smell and taste. We ate simply on thisholiday, working with what we had, combining our dried food from home along with the fresh, seasonal food from the farm. We were even blessed with a day of sunshine (which felt like the last real day of summer) so we were able to cook outside on the rocket stove. I had pre-measured out some spices for my favourite dishes, in this case it was a dahl, and folded them up neatly in a wax wrap.

We enjoyed the environment so much that we had no desire to leave, we literally did nothing and it was SO good. We had slow, lazy mornings of tea drinking and blueberry picking, we would feed the horses on the field next to us, read books, watch Willow exploring every plants, tree and bug, nap after lunch and then start meal preperations again for dinner. The tail end of summer allowed it to be chilly enough to snuggle round the fire and enjoy our favourite zero waste snack of snicker-doodles (date filled with nut butter!) 

 

We ventured out into the local town one day to check out a vegan food truck we had read about. Here we got falafel wraps (in paper) and a kombucha (in glass), it was great to see that we could access plant-based food but we are such foodies that we prefer our own (organic) cooking, so that evening we were back to picking our own.  

We share our family story with you, not because we have an affiliation with the farm (which we don’t). But because we want to show how we choose to relax and how we manage to do it with minimal waste. The farm is ran by two wonderful women that have worked the land into what I can only describe as an Eden, filled with life everywhere you look. The accommodation is finished to a very high standard consisting of a double bed, table/chairs, sofa, log fire and small kitchen area. The land it sits on is circled by trees and has a lovely decking area. The side of the horsebox lowers down so you can lie in bed and listen to the rustle of the trees and the birdsong. There is a compost toilet and an outdoor shower hut/washing area.

 

We left feeling refreshed, recharged and relaxed. The biggest blessing was to realize we were excited to come back to work, for that we are thankful.

  

 We stayed at the 'Tree of Life Organic Farm' in Cornwall, visit their website for more information.