Old Hall Farm

05/09/2026

Honey (and Hannah) left their calves behind in their excitement to get to the field….. Honey kindly did the walk of shame for them both 🤣🤣

04/09/2026

How can livestock farmers survive future droughts? 🌞💧

04/09/2026

Family over this weekend? 🍖 🥩 🍗
Head to our beautiful butchery counter to get your fill of the best local meats and produce all carefully prepped by our skilled team.
Shop open from 8-6 today and tomorrow (9-5 Sunday)

02/09/2026

Oreo Cookies & Cream Cake…

Real butter cakes made here at Old Hall Farm by our in house Baker!

Whole cakes available to order 2-3 weeks notice required

31/08/2026

31/08/2026

Agreed - much as I dislike agreeing with anything that the orange man says, rather like a stopped clock - it isn’t impossible for him to be right a couple of times a day 😉

Know your farmer, know your food and buy as locally as possible!

This caught my attention because once you strip away the Trump language, there is actually a serious farming question underneath it....yes I know, it surprised me too.

In the US, Trump is talking about breaking the grip of the huge meat processors and making it easier for farmers and ranchers to process more of their own food and sell it.

I know it's Donald Trump but when he talks about concentration, he has a point.

Just four companies, JBS USA, Tyson Foods, Cargill and National Beef Packing Co, account for roughly 85% of US beef processing.

Think about that for a moment.

The farmer buys the cattle, feeds them, houses them, carries the disease risk, carries the weather risk, carries the finance and spends months or years producing the animal.

Then, at the point where that animal becomes food, four enormous businesses control the vast majority of the processing capacity.

That gives processors an extraordinary amount of influence over the supply chain.

Sound familiar?

Here in the UK, we have spent years losing smaller abattoirs and local processing capacity. At the same time farmers are constantly told to diversify, add value, sell direct and shorten the supply chain.

How exactly are they supposed to do that if the infrastructure needed to process their own product has disappeared?

I am not suggesting for one second that we remove food safety controls, veterinary inspection, traceability or animal welfare standards. Our standards are rightly high.

Perhaps we should be asking whether the regulatory system could be more proportionate for smaller, local facilities.

Why couldn’t a group of local beef, sheep or pig farmers jointly own a small processing facility?

Why couldn’t government support farmer owned abattoirs, cutting plants, mobile slaughter units or cooperative processing hubs?

Why do we seem more comfortable helping farmers produce raw commodities than helping them retain more of the value further up the food chain?

For years the conversation has been:

“How do we stop small abattoirs closing?”

Perhaps the better question is:

“Why aren’t we helping farmers own them?”

In my mind, food security is not simply about growing or rearing food.

It is also about who controls what happens to it afterwards.

31/08/2026

Happy Bank holiday Monday…
Shop 8:00-17:00
Restaurant 9:00-16:30

30/08/2026

It’s feeling like that time of year… soups and broths are stocking up! Come visit us today shop open until 5pm 🥣

28/08/2026

Looking for something to occupy the children as we draw close to the end of the holidays? Why not book in to come and meet our resident Highland Cows 🐮 These short sessions, designed to accommodate our younger guests, offer an opportunity to stroke and feed Lory, Isla and Yumi. Priced at just £5 per person, these are an affordable and unique experience for the whole family to enjoy! We have plenty of spaces left on Monday morning - perfect for an end of bank holiday treat 😊
(Book via link in story)