Rick Stein's Cornwall

In this episode, Rick takes us to the place where his passion for Cornwall began – his family home at Trevose Head on the north Cornish coast, where as a child he would go fishing with his father. He explores the wild yet beautiful landscape of the Land’s End peninsula with the artist Kurt Jackson before heading to the tranquillity of an heritage apple orchard preserved by head gardener John Harris. Here Rick picks some apples to make his mother’s Apple Charlotte pudding.

Deep in the Cornish countryside, Rick Stein takes us to meet an extraordinary family who are making some of the best Gouda cheese in Britain, from which he cooks a tortilla dish with caramelised apples, onions and Cornish Gouda. In the fishing village of Mevagissey, he discovers the origins of the sea shanty and the history of the pilchard fishing industry, when shoals of pilchards were so large they would attract killer whales.

Rick Stein meets young chef Tom Adams, who runs Combeshead Farm, a leading field-to-fork restaurant in Cornwall. Here they grow and produce all of their own food, from sourdough bread to pork pies, as well as rearing a small heard of Mangalitsa pigs, a hairy, old-world breed which produces exquisite hams. Rick tries out a new recipe – pork chops with a sloe berry sauce – before moving on to the village of Rock, where his son Jack holds a clam bake on the shore of the Camel Estuary.

The town of Launceston in east Cornwall is bypassed by many who visit the county, yet Rick discovers that it’s home to an unusual superstition and a rare type of Norman castle. In the far west of Cornwall, Rick meets Graham Fitkin and Ruth Wall, two musicians who combine modern and traditional ways to make some extraordinary compositions. Rick rounds off his trip by cooking an alfresco dish of Cornish mussels with cider.

Rick Stein meets his good friend, the actor and comedian Barry Humphries, who fell in love with Cornwall in the 1960s when he escaped London to develop his now famous character, Dame Edna Everage, with near-disastrous consequences. Barry talks about his friendship with Britain’s favourite poet, John Betjeman, and asks Rick to review his homemade fishcakes. Rick also goes fishing for crab, before cooking a simple yet delicious crab omelette. And he takes a dip in the chilly north Atlantic with an eccentric group of wild water swimmers called the Perranporth Blue Tits.

Rick journeys inland from the majestic Camel Estuary to one of Britain’s finest vineyards, where he joins in harvesting the grapes to discover that the Cornish weather is perfect for making some of the best wine in the country. Just off Pentire Point, as the sun sets, Rick rides the gentle swell of the North Atlantic with an old friend, casting his line to hook Britain’s fastest fish, before firing up the barbecue to cook his catch with a recipe inspired by a trip to Goa. Rick joins Tim Smit, best known for starting the hugely successful Eden Project, who reveals to Rick his new and ambitious idea in Cornwall.