A Coastal Commute
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coast FOOD coast PEOPLE Bis inciduc iliatus nonsequis comnis mintem experit aliatem ullant, omnistiae odit od eum fugiaerum, con pa nimollorunt. PRESERVING Odi dis comnis TRADITIONS How Nick and Annette Tonkin dreamed up a small-scale food business on the Pembrokeshire coast, producing their own honey and artisan preserves, which are now stocked by Neal’s Yard and Harrods WORDS Kitty Corrigan PHOTOGRAPHS William Morris-Julien valuable package is on its way from West Wales to enjoy blackberry flowers, and at the end of July I move the CLOCKWISE, FROM TOP LEFT Pouring the marmalade into East Anglia. A queen bee is travelling by Royal Mail hives up to the Preseli Hills, which are transformed into a vast jars; organic sugar is used in marmalade production; the Special Delivery to join a new colony of bees that will sea of purple heather. At the very end of the season the bees organic oranges are imported from Seville; it’s all hands produce honey uniquely flavoured by the coastal flora delight in the ivy, before settling down for the winter.’ on deck at production time; raw honey on a natural honeycomb; preparing fruit; Coedcanlas takes its name of Lincolnshire. The Queen’s ‘carriage’ is a matchbox- from the hamlet where the Tonkins have based the Asized wood and wire-mesh cage inside which she is attended business; beekeeper, food producer and sailor Nick Tonkin A COASTAL COMMUTE by seven worker bees whose duty is to feed her with candy Nick never takes for granted the view over the Daugleddau and groom her throughout the cross-country journey. Estuary, where wintering wildfowl feed on the mudflats at low Her lineage is assured, as she has been bred by specialist tide, and swans, egrets and osprey are all common. Shelduck Nick Tonkin of Lawrenny, Pembrokeshire, an artisan food and mallard breed there in summer, a merlin regularly flies producer whose beekeeper father and botanist mother took along the road in front of him on his commute to work, and over a honey farm near Okehampton in Devon when he was swallows return each year to nest under the eaves in late one year old. His 77-year-old father still cares for 300 hives spring, followed by swifts a little later. there today, and passed on his skills and love of the natural Four years ago, Nick and his wife Annette decided to market world to his son. their range of honeys under the brand name Coedcanlas, For Nick’s colonies of 90 hives, each with around 40,000 after the hamlet where their mini factory – a vast wooden residents, the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park is the shed – is located, conveniently guarded by a flurry of scouting Garden of Eden, with an abundance of wildflowers, herbs bees. Powered by a biomass boiler and with rainwater- and plants to plunder. ‘In spring they feed on bluebells, harvesting equipment in place, it’s just a short drive from their dandelions, hawthorn and clovers,’ Nick says. ‘Later they home, a former shepherd’s cottage, though when the inlet 64 COAST coastmagazine.co.uk coastmagazine.co.uk 65 COAST coast PEOPLE coast FOOD floods the road twice a day at high tide, a detour skirting the complete the current range, much of it wrapped and labelled village is necessary. late at night at the kitchen table – a true cottage industry. But The quiet period between honey harvests sparked the idea the hard work is paying dividends, as they now sell to outlets of adding other products to the business, and so the Tonkins in Bristol, Bath and London (including Neal’s Yard and Harrods), first imported organic Seville oranges in January for marmalade, as well as within Wales. They make most deliveries to shops when it’s all hands on deck to make batches of 30 pounds at themselves, one of their favourite trips being to Hay Deli in a time. Their younger daughter Mauke, 11, plays her part by Hay-on-Wye, where daughter Mauke loves being let loose in scooping out the insides of the fruit, while family friend Deborah, the bookshops. Abergavenny Food Festival in September is a chef, helps every weekend slicing the skins (and is paid in another highlight – a good opportunity to spread the word on produce). With the addition of the finest organic Cuban sugar, honey and the whole range, in the company of scores of other the mixture is stirred and heated to a rolling boil in antique artisan producers, attracting food-lovers from far and wide. French copper pans, then bottled in attractive jars with distinctive labels, created by a graphic designer friend, Will. SHIP TO SHORE Nick is always keen to get back home to the coast, however, THE AMBER NECTAR not least to tend to his wooden boat, Chinkara, a 46ft classic ‘To be an artisan food company, you need to have one designed by prolific yacht designer Fred Shepherd in 1903. It speciality, so the bees are the core of what we do,’ Nick says, is moored below Lawrenny Quay and meticulously maintained ‘but when you are delivering to a customer, you can ask them by Nick in the hope that one day, when it has its new mast, to sample other products and hope they will place an order. he will set sail in it again. In the meantime, he scrubs the This is how we have been able to expand, though we are not decks, paints and varnishes it, and the whole family camp NICK and ANNETTE’S yet at the stage where we can employ anyone else.’ there at every opportunity. A chance connection with a Mennonite community in It was Nick’s love of a seafaring life that lured him to Wales perfect LAWRENNY Canada inspired the inclusion of maple syrup in the 22 years ago. When working on a honey farm in New Zealand CLOCKWISE, FROM TOP LEFT In winter, when it’s quiet Coedcanlas range. Described by Nick as ‘laidback Amish’, in 1985, he met a keen sailor and boatbuilder named Richard, between honey harvests, Coedcanlas goes into marmalade production mode; some of the 90 hives which each house WEEKEND the religious sect in Holstein, Ontario, devote themselves to and together they crewed a boat from Auckland to Antigua, around 40,000 bees and are moved in spring and summer God, family and the community. Modern transport is forbidden, then worked for a time in the Caribbean. Years later, when to allow the bees to avail of as many different flowers as so produce is driven to town by horse and buggy or sold at Nick dreamed up a plan to sail up the River Lena into Siberia possible to add flavour to the honey; lemons for the marmalade come from a grower the Tonkins met in Sicily t"OBGUFSOPPOCSFBLXJUIGSJFOETBU the end of the farm track – and now also to Nick and Annette. in his beloved boat, he needed help from his boatbuilder Quayside Tearoom, open Easter to In February and March, as the sap rises in the 1,100 maple friend and tracked him down to Pembrokeshire. Nick was September. It serves delicious sandwiches trees on the farm, Delton Martin, his wife and five sons collect living in a caravan in a friend’s field when he met Annette, and freshly baked cakes, but also roast the liquid from simple tin pails tied to each trunk, and heat it who ran a wholefood shop in Pembroke at the time and had lobster, homemade smoked mackerel over a wood fire in a sugar shack. Nothing is added and only the cottage they now share. pâté and local crab. Drinks include Welsh water removed. It takes 40 litres of sap to make one litre of Two children later, Nick still harbours his dream of a life on cider and local beers, Welsh/Italian coffees syrup, which is what makes this work-intensive nectar such the ocean waves (Mauke is named after a small Pacific island) and speciality teas (01646 651574, a special treat. When it arrives at the shed in Wales, it’s heated but for the time being he is happily stranded with his family quaysidelawrenny.co.uk). again and bottled, to be enjoyed on pancakes, porridge, French on the coast of Wales. And besides, he can’t abandon toast, and sweet and savoury dishes throughout the year. three-and-a-half million bees. t"GBWPVSJUFXBMLJTBMPOHUIFCFBDIBU ‘Delton Martin is a mixed organic farmer and this is just one Order from Nick and Annette Tonkin at coedcanlas.com. Freshwater West – ‘magnificent sunsets, of his crops,’ Annette explains. ‘We know that he looks after dramatic winter storms, great for surfing his trees with as much care as his livestock, and we’re looking and beachcombing’. When a wood forward to visiting him at harvest time to help with the maple freighter lost its deck cargo a few years syrup production.’ ago, Nick salvaged some of it to repair the interior of his boat, Chinkara. A COTTAGE INDUSTRY FREE POT OF MARMALADE Meanwhile, the Coedcanlas Sicilian Collection came about t'BNJMZWJTJUTUPStackpole Quay near through visiting the Mediterranean island where the couple’s READER OFFER Pembroke, part of a nature reserve owned elder daughter Josie, 21, was spending time as part of her coast readers who place an order for £20 or by the National Trust. Eight miles of sandy Modern Languages degree. ‘We met Pasquelino, a lemon more (excluding p&p) will receive a free jar of beaches, ancient woodland, cliffs and grower whose fruit we now use in our marmalade, and he No5 Sicilian Lemon Marmalade (if stocks run coves (01646 661359, nationaltrust.org.