The Countess of Carnarvon - Seasons at Highclere: Gardening, Growing, and Cooking Through the Year at the Real Downton Abbey

This book is dedicated to my sisters, some of whom cook and some of whom garden; to Nanny, who observes each activity offering her opinion; and to Edward and Geordie, with whom and for whom I love to cook and garden.

For everything there is a season, to grow, to cook and to hope for reason.

Seasons at Highclere Gardening, Growing and Cooking Through the Year at The Real Downton Abbeyshares the history and reality of living in a great landed estate, from its Anglo-Saxon origins through 800 years as a medieval bishops palace and then into the great Victorian and Edwardian gardens of the real Downton Abbey. From the enduring timelessness of the iconic cedars of Lebanon, to rooms with a view within the Castle, this book is an opportunity to share the layers of historical research about the gardens and landscape, to retell anecdotes and include recipes, from family picnics to formal dinners in the great State Dining Room.

The Highclere Estate has a uniquely long history spanning nearly 1,300 years, with very few changes of ownership. For 800 years it was owned by the Bishops of Winchester and it still stands, more or less, on the same footprint as it did then, with the old medieval walls lying within the curtilage of the current Castle and gardens.

From a bishops palace, Highclere became an elegant Tudor family residence, which was purchased by my husbands forbears in 1679. Later, the Carnarvon family built a symmetrical, classical, stone Georgian home around the Elizabethan building. This lasted until the 3rd Earl of Carnarvon commissioned the pre-eminent Victorian architect Sir Charles Barry to design and build the current Castle which is so known and loved today. Barry was inspired by his travels in Italy, by the colours and sights he saw there, and he regarded Highclere as perhaps his most successful project, and far more enjoyable than his contemporaneous one: the Houses of Parliament.

Initially, this new Highclere was also called a palace before being renamed Highclere Castle. It has a cosy splendour, with between 250 and 300 rooms, and sits in 1,000 acres of Capability Brown parkland. We still look after farmland, downland and woodland comprising another 4,500 acres.

There are certain practicalities of looking after a twelfth-century monks garden, of understanding the development of a classic eighteenth-century English garden, the sweeping changes of Capability Brown and the need and desire to allow space and peace for wildlife. After all, it is their home too.

There is no subject of more general use than the cultivation of land and improvement of the vegetable world.
Richard Bradley, New Improvements of Planting and Gardening, 1739

Despite the impact of modern technology, we are all affected by the changing seasons and by the memories they trigger. The bursts of colour, sounds of birdsong, frisking lambs and fresh bright light that herald spring and the warmth and drowsiness of an English summer: insects amongst the wildflower meadows, the sound of a tennis ball being hit and the thought of fresh homemade lemonade in a tall jug. Autumn has a crisp smell in the air, with the crunch of leaves underfoot and the crimson colours of distant views, whilst winter is pale, with brisk walks on ancient white-chalk downlands, eating hot stews or roasting chestnuts by the fire and sharing cosy conversations with friends and family. Our four seasons involve all the senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch, and they all live in our memories.

Every autumn, at our harvest festival, we sing the Hymn of the Hampshire Countryside ( ) whilst a variety of patient animals, tractors and bags of wheat, oats and barley wait outside. It is not short but it does proceed at a steady beat, which gives me time to think as we move from praise for the maker of upland and plain to the ancient paths in which footprints are engraven to the leaves for thy pillow and ling (heather/moss) for thy bed. One verse sensibly asks of the farmer and his harvest where is the labour to fetch it all home?, which always wrings a wry smile from my husband, Geordie. It is an endlessly repeated cycle in which the land gathers up its life to start again each year as we look up into the starry night, waking or sleeping.

Praise we The Lord, the great Author of Nature Praise we the maker of upland and plain; Praise we the Spirit through whom every creature Gathers its life and renews it again.

Once did The Son of God mighty the wonder Walk this Earths dusty paths, tread on its loam; Once did he look on the harvest and ponder: Where is the labour to fetch it all home?