November 2020 at Stourton

Our Festive Fresh Venison Box

We are delighted to launch our first ever Festive Fresh Venison Box.

This limited edition box, costing £60 contains:

• A selection of Steaks including: haunch, sirloin, and frying steak (approximately 6 steaks in total)
• 1 pack of gluten free burgers (4 burgers)
• 1 pack of gluten free sausages (6 sausages)
• Casserole / Braising Steak (approx. 500g)
• Mince (approx. 500g)

Plus some delicious traditional accompaniments:

• Gordon RhodesFestive GF Stuffing,
• A pot of Bay Tree Redcurrant Jelly,
• Maille Dijon mustard; and
• A little chocolate treat!

Whether buying for yourself or a food-loving friend or family member, this box is perfect for treating the family over the Christmas period.  It contains a great range of versatile cuts to enjoy – these can also be used instead of your usual meat in some of your favourite recipes or take a look at our recipe gallery for more inspiration.

Orders can be placed now for delivery on Friday 11th December and we will be in touch to arrange a delivery time with you.

As well as our Festive box, our usual Royal and Imperial venison boxes are available to order for delivery on either 11^th or 18^th December.

We can now deliver nationwide!

All fresh venison boxes ordered are delivered FREE within a 20 mile radius of the farm.  If you live between 20-30 miles of the farm additional delivery charges will apply.

For those of you who live further than 30 miles away or wish to send a venison box as a gift we can now offer courier delivery of our fresh boxes nationwide. For this we charge £10 for post and packaging which is added to your order at checkout.

Lincolnshire Kitchen Cookbook for LIVES

Stourton Estates are very excited to be included in this brand new cookbook, Lincolnshire Kitchen.

You will find our one pot root vegetable venison casserole recipe using our finest venison casserole (or braising steak) to deliver a mouth-watering dish we hope you enjoy cooking and eating!  Our recipe sits proudly with a huge range of Lincolnshire food producers who have also put forward their very best recipes.

The cookbook has been produced to raise vital funds for Lincolnshire charity, LIVES. Did you know the charity attended over 13,000 emergency 999 calls last year? The volunteers who give their time need to fund their training, on-going support and equipment, which LIVES provide.

Lincolnshire Kitchen will be available in a number of Lincolnshire Co-op Stores this winter, through the LIVES website and the link to purchase is available on our website too.

The cookbook is available for £9.99 and every penny will goes to LIVES. We are proud to support a charity that so clearly looks after communities right across our county.

Kiln Dried Logs are available for delivery up to 18th December

You are certainly keeping us busy delivering your kiln dried log and Christmas tree orders.  Christmas trees have now sold out!  Don’t miss out on logs – place your order now… we can deliver log orders all the way up to 18^th December 2020.  So do get online and place your order for pre-Christmas delivery now!

You can rest assured that we are taking all steps necessary to make all home deliveries or collections from the farm COVID secure; offering contact free and socially distanced deliveries or collections.

On the Farm

And breathe… we’ll say it quietly but we have finally got our planned autumn cropping in the ground thanks to the hard work of our team. The latest sown winter wheat is just starting to emerge and is looking good on all but the heaviest of our land. We finished sowing winter beans on the 24^th November in largely good conditions. It has felt like a bit of a slog to get everything in this Autumn, but we are pleased to be well ahead of where we were this time last year. The beans now need their pre-emergence herbicide, with the lighter land wheat requiring an application of nutrition to see it through winter.

We will be lifting a little more sugar beet imminently; the results from our first lifted field are relatively pleasing for the year. It seems our area has escaped the worst of the virus yellows impact, in the south of the county where there is a large amount of veg crops grown the beet crop has suffered immensely. Looking ahead it is of great concern to us that sugar beet has a viable future, our fingers are crossed that the necessary derogation for seed treatment is now granted by DEFRA as previous requests have not been granted. More information about virus yellows and what may be done in the future can be found here and here.

Over the winter Ken will be busy working through the machinery fleet to make sure it is in good condition to be put to work next spring. Usually in winter our workshop is bitterly cold even with a small diesel space heater. We have recently invested in a new clean burning heater supplied by Louth Tractors which should keep Ken nice and warm in there. It will also double as a heater for our events during the winter months (when we are able to put them on again).

If anyone has any questions for us about the farm and how and why we do things the way we do please do get in touch. Until next time…

On the Estate

We are very excited to announce that our flushing toilets are now fully installed and operational.  Situated right next to the safari tent, the new loos will significantly increase the comfort of our guests whether they are visiting the estate for an open day or attending a private event.  Let’s hope they get a bit of use next year!

As well as loo installation we have carried out the annual mow of the arboretum.  We do this every autumn to encourage wildflower regeneration for the next year. The spoil from the mow is left behind to increase soil fertility, ensuring strong future growth and a wide variety of species to grow and live within the habitat.

Deer Diary

It’s been a bit noisy around the estate for the last few weeks as the rut has been in full swing.  Thankfully all is now calming down and the stags are no longer as ‘boisterous’. The end of the rut sees a dramatic drop in testosterone in the stags and this leads to the loss of their antlers, as they are no longer needed for duelling with their rivals. We currently have a few antler sets available to buy on our website.

Deer Safari Vouchers make a great Christmas Gift

We really hope that next year we get the opportunity to open up and share our beautiful parkland with you.  We are offering deer safari vouchers for sale, which would make an excellent Christmas gift.  We will honour them at any of our events next year.

We hope that you are all keeping safe and well.

Antony & Helen