Great British Beef Week at The Farmer's Dog pub and a farm data time saver

Hannah: 00:00:00

Phil, the first thing I want to know is how was your marathon?

Phil: 00:00:03

What, the chocolate bar or the run?

Hannah: 00:00:08

That was a laugh because I don't know what a marathon bar is.

Phil: 00:00:11

Oh, crikey. It's what used to be a Snickers. Oh, did you not know that?

Hannah: 00:00:16

No, I've heard of it. I've never had one.

Martin: 00:00:18

He was walking with a bit of a Snickers after the marathon in Paris.

Hannah: 00:00:22

What was your time, Phil?

Phil: 00:00:24

I did it in just over four hours. Four hours, three minutes, 27 seconds. It's kind of like ingrained in my head because of the.

The challenge of doing it and in terms of afterwards recovery. I just ate some steak, seemed to do some good. So, yeah, definitely promote beef as a. As a recovery fuel.

Hannah: 00:00:45

Is it Tom Gilby, the wine guy, he did a wine marathon and every mile he stopped and tried a different glass of wine, and he had a little wine glass on his. On his belt when he was running.

Martin: 00:00:54

That's the sort of thing that will get you signed up. Yeah. Hannah.

Phil: 00:01:13

Hi, I'm Phil Maiden.

Hannah: 00:01:15

I'm Hannah Clarke and welcome to The AG Show.

Phil: 00:01:18

In this episode, we're joined by the head butcher at the Farmer's Dog pub.

Hannah: 00:01:22

That's right.

We may not have Charlotte Forkes-Rees with us this week, but we do have Charlotte Kingham, who plies her trade at the pub made famous by a certain Jeremy Clarkson.

Phil: 00:01:32

Charlotte's here to talk about why it's important to back campaigns like Great British Beef Week.

Charlotte: 00:01:37

If they've enjoyed that and they've had a British steak, absolutely brilliant. If they come down to hops and chops and buy a steak off me.

But even better if they think, actually, no, let's go home to my local butcher and buy a steak from them, because I know that's British. And then we're supporting our local community as well.

Hannah: 00:01:52

We'll also be talking about the creation of a farm Data Exchange. Given AIDS, HDB's proof of concept pilot has shown that it's both technically viable and strongly supported across industry.

Adam: 00:02:03

We did demonstrate that if the data exists somewhere already, we're able to access that information and enable it reuse when permissioned by a pharma. So it's kind of founded on this principle of enter once and use many times.

Phil: 00:02:18

A reminder, new episodes of the Ag show drop every Wednesday at midday. Available wherever you get your podcasts.

Charlotte: 00:02:26

That's right.

Hannah: 00:02:27

You can listen to us and watch our pretty faces as we have audio and video versions available for every show. Just subscribe to make sure you don't.

Phil: 00:02:35

Miss an episode and get in touch.

We'd love to hear from you, comment on any of our social posts or email akshowhdb.org UK let's start this week with a look at Great British Beef Week, which runs from the 23rd to the 30th of April.

Hannah: 00:02:53

We help promote the nationwide campaign created by Ladies In Beef that looks to champion the supply chain from the farmers who produce the beef to the butchers, farm shops and retailers who supply it.

Phil: 00:03:05

Well, we thought we'd get the perspective from a farm shop based butcher and recently caught up with Charlotte Kingham.

Hannah: 00:03:12

Charlotte is the head butcher at the Farmer's Dog Pub. You may know of the place if you ever watched Clarkson's Farm.

She told us how she landed the job when she still had one eye on doing some travelling abroad.

Charlotte: 00:03:23

it was opening, it was August: 2024

So I applied for the bar, turned up on the first day.

I think I'd got about two hours into the shift and they needed the butcher, sort of our butchery consultant now, but our sort of butcher who started it up at the time needed a hand and I was like, well, my dad's a butcher, I've done a couple of months. I could sort of give you a hand over the weekend if you'd like.

So did the weekend for them, obviously, just wrapping sausages, serving a couple of steaks, cooking a bit of a couple of sausage rolls here and there. And then, yeah, by the end of the weekend they said, do you want to be on the butchers full time?

And at first I was sort of like, I don't know, because obviously I was still planning to go back to America. I've still got a lot of traveling that I, you know, still want to do. So it was quite a big decision.

But I thought, well, you know, stick at it for a couple of months, they need someone. I quite enjoyed it. Let's just see what happens. Nearly two years down the line, I'm still here and now running, running hops and chops.

So, yeah, completely accidental, but well, well worth it.

Hannah: 00:04:27

That's incredible. Was that a bit of a baptism of fire that first sort of weekend?

Charlotte: 00:04:31

Oh, 100%. It was from.

I think it was the Thursday there was like a bit of a soft launch and on Friday we opened and it was all guns blazing, just people Came out of nowhere.

I was like, I've never seen so many people in one place and, you know, they're asking me questions about this and about, you know, what cuts this and what cuts this. And like, I could answer it because obviously I'd done like throughout young farmers. I've done a lot of carcass judging, a lot of stock charging.

So obviously that sort of background gave me a big like leg up into like that first weekend. But yeah, it was just mental. Yeah, it could have put you off, but yeah, luckily I stuck with it.

Phil: 00:05:08

So you did a bit of carcass judging and stopped judging. In your time then, Charlotte, did you find that that helped you to gain the skills that you needed to be a butcher?

Charlotte: 00:05:17

Yeah, 100%, like from. Yeah, I started stop judging first and I didn't sort of carcass judge until about maybe five years ago, maybe 20, 21.

And I remember looking at the first carcass, I was like, oh my God, I don't even know what I'm looking for.

But, you know, after a year, you know, we, the club I'm in Gloucestershire, we've got really, we've got really good group of us that are really keen on carcass judging. And the farmer that I worked for on my placement was also, he judged at Smithfield back in the day.

So obviously I've got all this knowledge around me.

So being able to have the live animal and then look at it dead and know if it's going to make a good beast or bad and sort of why is it good or why is it bad? What's that better point?

And even just the public speaking side of it as well, like being able to talk in front of the judges for two minutes, that's really helped me be able to talk to customers. Like, if you told me 10 years ago that I'd be in a sort of customer facing job, I'd be like, absolutely no chance.

Like, I don't, I don't mind talking to people but I have to know them.

Adam: 00:06:18

They.

Charlotte: 00:06:18

But yeah, so the carcass, judging from the knowledge side and the actual confidence it gave me, it, yeah, 100% helped in so many different ways.

Phil: 00:06:26

I certainly enjoyed doing a bit of that and young farmers, but I never went on to be a butcher. So it'd be interesting to know what makes a good butcher.

Charlotte: 00:06:35

If I'm honest right from the start. It's just confidence, like as long as you sort of know what you're talking about and you're eager to learn, like you're Happy to listen to.

I've trained up under a couple of really good, really skilled, high skilled butchers in the last couple of years and being able to listen to what they say, it's not just watching what they do, but it's listening to what they have to say and why they do things like that and why maybe they take, they leave the rib on the roastings rather than leave it on the fore quarter and like loads of different snippets. I think it's half eagerness to learn, being willing to listen to people that actually know, have a lot of experience, obviously a lot more than I do.

And yeah, the confidence, because if you're confident with your knife, if you're, if you're not confident and you're sort of like going a bit, not slow but you know, you're sort of a bit wobbly, then you're never going to be a good butcher.

But if you're confident enough to be like, right, I know what I'm doing, let's just go straight down long strokes, you're halfway there and you can just pick up everything like as you go along.

And I've actually learned a lot off and it sounds a bit silly but like YouTube videos and watching people, obviously there's a lot of butchers on social media now that are breaking down animals and different cuts and how they cook it. And just watching those videos, it's really helpful to sort of then you go and put it into practice.

Phil: 00:07:49

So Charlotte, before we carry on, you've been kind enough to record a quick tour of the hops and chops meat counter at the farmer's dog. And as we want to talk about Great British Beef Week, I think that's your focus.

Charlotte: 00:08:01

Starting off from the front, we have our pre cut steaks. So we have dry aged sirloin, dry aged ribeye and dry aged rump. Sirloin would be, in my opinion, one of the better cuts of steaks.

Got that nice layer of fat on top which is obviously full of flavour. Moving on to then the ribeye which come in from the river beef. We have a nice bit of marbling in there. Again, full of flavour, perfect, sort of.

That's again your more high end steak. And coming around this side, we then have our dry aged rump steak. It's all dry aged for 28 days.

And yeah, again the rump is one of our lower on the scale, sort of our lower cuts of steak coming in about 30 pounds cheaper than your ribeye per kilo. It's a more leaner meat but you still have that bit of fat covering over the top and a little bit throughout, but not too much going behind.

You've got, then obviously got your rump here, you've got the rump cap and then your, you know, your main fillet of rump. If we were staking this for the pub, for our specials, I would just basically cut it down the middle.

There's a sort of seam that comes up here and I'd take the gristle out and I take the gristle out. There's a bit of gristle that runs in just in the middle of the ramp here to take that out. Ready for steaks?

Obviously, you don't want to put anything tough when you're eating the glorious, glorious steaks we have here. Then have our ribeye again. You can see the lovely marbling throughout it.

Behind we've got our British trimmed rubber beef and our traditional rubber beef. So this is where the ribeyes come from.

You can dress the rubber beef in many different ways, so you can leave it traditional with a fat cap on and the bones untrimmed. Or you can have our British trimmed river beef, which is obviously bones trimmed.

I don't take the fat cap off, some butchers do, but I like to leave the fat cap on just for that added bit of flavour. And I can take it off if the customer wants.

But you also have, say if it's a Sunday roast, you'd rather that little bit of extra meat and a little bit of extra fat.

Hannah: 00:09:57

Charlotte, you clearly know your stuff. I'm interested in what life is like at the Farmer's Dog for you. What's your team like?

Charlotte: 00:10:04

Life at the Farmer's Dog is very busy.

I think people's perception is that we are different to your other, you know, local butchers, but we are just like your butchers down the road on the high street in your village, in that we're all working for British agriculture and British Beef. And to be able to have.

Okay, we might have a higher profile than some of the butchers, than other butchers, but we can use that profile to educate public shout about British agriculture, British butchery and supporting your local butchers. So I think life at the Farmer's Dog is very similar to other butchers in that we're all working towards the same thing.

We're all trying to support British agriculture.

Hannah: 00:10:45

And what's your butchery team like?

Charlotte: 00:10:49

So I've got someone. Sorry, a dog's just come in. Let me just kick her out, if that's okay.

Hannah: 00:10:55

I mean, that's very on brand, isn't it? Father's dog coming in.

Charlotte: 00:10:59

It is the, on the farmer's puppy. We have a picture of, well, Fergus, the farmer's puppy. And this is Fergus's sister who's just joined us. Come on, say hi.

Phil: 00:11:08

Come on, Fergus's sister. You're interrupting the podcast recording.

Charlotte: 00:11:11

I thought it was someone important coming in. Then she comes waddling through the door. Well, yeah, sorry, yeah. So the, it was butchery team. Yeah.

We've got a guy who's had 10 years experience, he's part time, just comes and helps us, which is very good because also I learn a lot off him as well. And then we have Jess who basically runs our deli because that's another high. That's one of our best products is our deli.

Sausage rolls, pastas, obviously, like I talked about earlier, having the nose to tail butchery. That's one of our ways that we can make, ensure that we're using the whole animals.

And then we've got a part time helper who is actually a football scout for a big football team but works here part time, just helping out. So he's very good.

And again, like I was saying earlier about what makes a good butcher is he's very eager to learn and he's very good at listening and he's very, he's confident with a knife. So, you know, putting him on actual butchery stuff, you know, I'm still learning but I can teach other people as well, which is, yeah, really good.

Hannah: 00:12:14

Yeah.

It's interesting you say your, your team's predominantly female, which I guess is a common perception, isn't there, about the butchery industry being maybe male dominated? But that's not your experience.

Charlotte: 00:12:25

No. I was actually having this conversation with my dad the other day and he said, you know, like I said, he's been a butcher for 50 years.

All of his time he said he's never met a female butcher. For me now to, at one point we did have, I think it was four females, one male on our team. And you know, everyone is as confident as everyone.

All the people I've trained under are men, but I haven't found any challenges from that. You know, you're treated the same. You're, you know, it's like again, like it comes back to the confidence thing.

As long as you're confident in what you're doing and you can, you know, you are like I said, eager to learn and listen, you're treated the same. But it would be really, really cool if I could inspire Some more females to get into butchery.

A couple have started popping up on my social media, so that's always interesting to watch and see what they're doing and whereabouts in the country they. So, yeah, if, you know, if I can inspire more girls to join butchery, then brilliant.

Phil: 00:13:15

Just thinking about the fact you're at the Farmer's Dog. I mean, it's quite noticeable as a customer, just how busy it can get there.

Booking a table for the restaurant, for example, I mean, it's an absolute bonfire. Does that. And also the media attention that obviously the site gets, does that add pressure.

Charlotte: 00:13:33

For you, the booking the table side of things? It's always brilliant that our restaurant is full because what they're eating in the pub is what we're serving over in the butchers.

If someone enjoys a nice steak or pie here, then we sell it over in the butchers and they can come over. So that's sort of.

I wouldn't say pressure, but also sort of helps us because we've actually got our cooked products just 100 yards up from where the butcher's is.

So that sort of works really well for us and we work together as a whole site across all the different kitchens to make sure that everything we're serving is obviously from our cooperative, but also consistent across the whole site.

The media attention, obviously, there's always going to be that added bit of pressure because you do never know if there's a journalist coming around the corner, hopefully speaking for everyone on site here. But we're all very proud to work here. We're all very proud to be championing British agriculture, 100% British produce.

You know, you have to make sure you're on your front foot at all times.

Phil: 00:14:28

And do you find as well, do you get any celebs in?

Charlotte: 00:14:31

Yeah, we've had a few. We had Alex Scott and Jess Glyn in the other day having some pizza. I think we had Sir Chris Hoy in as well yesterday, I believe.

I think he was accidentally turned away for a table, though, because nobody knew who he was. So that was a bit embarrassing when you sort of heard that come back.

Obviously, gossip spreads like wildfire here, so it got down to the tent pretty quickly. But, yeah, you know, we get a few famous faces. Yeah, it's again, just comes with it.

But again, it's nice to be able to champion what we're doing and show everyone, public and famous, whoever you are, but how brilliant British beef is and British produce.

Phil: 00:15:12

You mentioned about the fact, obviously you've got the connection with the pub and how intrinsic it is between kind of the fact that you've got your produce cooking next door.

Do you think that's something that maybe some of the pubs and butcheries should kind of look at and think about whether they could do the same, sort of kind of link up 100%?

Charlotte: 00:15:32

I think we do use a whole animal's nose to tail here and I think just having that aspect, the cooking aspect on site is it makes us using the whole carcass a lot easier because we have a lot of different avenues that we can, like, push it down. But I also think it, it does help, like, if you're.

And actually not just for us, like if someone enjoys a really nice sirloin steak here in the pub, been cooked for them, obviously come out with all their seasonal veg. If they've enjoyed that and they've had a British steak, absolutely brilliant. If they come down to hops and chops and buy steak off me.

But even better if they think, actually, no, let's go home to my local butcher and buy a steak from them, because I know that's British. And then we' supporting our local community as well.

So, again, our point is, yes, obviously always good if they come and buy a steak from me, but if they're going home and going support their local communities, then, you know, everyone's winning.

Hannah: 00:16:21

I think that was a really nice example of how we can get local produce out to the masses. And we'll hear more from Charlotte later in the show.

Phil: 00:16:29

Coming up.

Very shortly, we'll be talking about a data exchange and how AHDB looks to have come up with a solution to reduce the need for farmers to repeatedly enter the same information while still retaining control over how it's used.

Hannah: 00:18:42

Right. It's that point of the show where we have a look at what's going on in the world. Phil, what have you been reading in the news recently?

Phil: 00:18:48

Well, Hannah, I have noticed AHDB's been in the news a lot recently. Particularly we've been talking about the impact of the war in the Middle east and what impact that's been having on farmers.

But another story I spotted involved the Pork Sector director, Mark Hayton. He's been speaking to no other than Naga man Chetty on BBC Radio 5 live about the rules around feeding kitchen scraps to pigs.

And it's after a caller to Naga's show told her he was going to get a couple of pigs to mop up his food waste. But Mark was on hand to make sure Naga's listeners know there are strict rules in place and that feeding scraps to farmed animals is against the law.

Mark: 00:19:29

nd domestic kitchen scraps in: 2001

Naga: 00:19:41

Ah, so hold on.

So explain the link to me because most people think, well, my food's fine, it's safe, I've cooked it, or it's just the scraps and that was fine for me to eat.

Naga: 00:19:52

So why is it not good enough for the animals to eat A disease.

Mark: 00:19:56

Like African swine fever, it doesn't hurt humans at all, but it is significantly harmful to pigs and it's very contagious.

And due to the amount of illegal meat imports that are coming into the country at the moment, there could be African swine fever meat within the country already and feeding untreated or any kitchen scraps to pigs.

Naga: 00:20:18

So we're not just talking about meat.

Mark: 00:20:19

Meat could transfer across to kitchen scraps within a kitchen.

And so giving carrot peelings, potato peelings to pigs, you could be transferring diseased meat into them to then pass on to other pigs across the country.

Phil: 00:20:36

So there you go, Hannah, that's what you need to know. When it comes to the rules around feeding scraps to farm animals and carrying.

Hannah: 00:20:43

On the pig theme, there's less than one month to go until the British Pig and Poultry Fair which takes place on the 13th and 14th of May. Now this is one of key dates in the pig industry calendar as it brings together producers, processors and industry partners all under one roof.

So it's a great opportunity to step away from the day to day and focus what's next for your business. And to make it even sweeter, tickets are free.

So HDB will be on stand across both days offering practical evidence led support on the challenges and opportunities facing the sector, covering things from productivity and efficiency to markets, disease prevention, which is a really hot topic at the moment obviously, and consumer demand.

So if you go along, you can meet the team, you can ask questions, book one to one conversations and even try our virtual reality headsets which I've had firsthand experience with at the Christmas do. To see pork production and supply chains from a different perspective, what do you get to see?

Phil: 00:21:42

Han?

Hannah: 00:21:42

The headsets take you inside pork abattoirs. Pig abattoirs basically. So you get to basically imaginarily stand inside an abattoir and look round and, and kind of see the process.

So it's, it's fascinating. So yeah, that'll be at pig and Poultry Fair.

But the first day starts on the 13th of May at 9am Mark Hayton, our sector Director, will be there as well and there'll be lots of discussions in the Pig Forum theatre afterwards. So register now. Now, something else in the news that caught Our Eye was HDB's farm data exchange Proof of Concept pilot. That's a mouthful.

Which has shown it could reduce the need for farmers to repeatedly input their information.

Martin: 00:22:22

Yep.

Phil: 00:22:22

It demonstrated that information can be drawn from other databases, but importantly, farmers would still have the say on who can access their details. And to find out more about it with us is AHDB's Data Programs Associate Director, Adam Short. So Adam, welcome to the Ag Show.

What was the main goal of the AHDB farm data Exchange pilot?

Adam: 00:22:45

Oh, well, I mean there's a little bit of history to it, but two years ago when this started, the investigation started really it was to see if, if there was anything here that HDB could add value to in the arena of data burden on farmers, data sharing across the industry, that sort of a thing. And the aims really got more focused as we got into that.

And it was really interesting because across those, what is two years now of stakeholder engagement activities with farmers, with the supply chain, with banks, with insurance companies, farmers retailers, everybody was saying the same thing. The data requests are incoherent and uncoordinated and that's causing pain for farmers.

And there is a distinct lack of transparency, trust and control.

Phil: 00:23:31

And we spoke about this at the Oxford Farming Conference at the start of this year. The pilot's now over. What did the proof of concept show that worked well?

Adam: 00:23:40

We worked with a cohort of actual farmers. It was only a small group really, but we had 17 farmers actually building the system with us and that co design element was important.

That went well in itself.

We were able then to gather first hand impressions from those farmers as we went through and really get their feedback about whether this was going to offer them value and where it was going to offer value. And value is another persistent theme in this.

But we did demonstrate that if the data exists somewhere already, so a farmer has entered it once in some way, we're able to access that information and enable it reuse when permissioned by a farmer for a specific purpose. And that's the crucial bit. So it's kind of founded on this principle of enter once and use many times.

Hannah: 00:24:25

And you talk about the trust piece and importantly to have permission from the producers to use the data. How does the pilot and the Exchange Proof of concept do that? How does it Protect farmers information.

Adam: 00:24:40

It's really trimmed down to make it as simple as we possibly can. Even given that it can sometimes be a little bit complex to explain.

I'll try it with a what it is, and I'll try it with a what it isn't, because sometimes that's more helpful for people. I describe it as plumbing and permissions. So we've built a system.

There's definitely a system, a platform there, but what it really is is a permission center and a bunch of connections, a bunch of plumbing. The plumbing enables the data to flow, but in the middle you've got a big break, and the break is the permission center.

So somebody may request some, let's say a carbon calculator company, on behalf of a processor, has requested a whole bunch of primary activity data from a farmer.

That request is coming into the permission center, but they're not getting access to that data until the farmer's been in, reviewed the request, decided which bits they'd like to give, which bits they wouldn't like to give, and press the appropriate yes or no buttons. Then the data is chipped and the person who's regretted it can do what they need to do with it.

Of course, behind all of that, there's all sorts of conversations about value that's inherent in that data, what contractual terms have been agreed between those parties.

But fundamentally, the farm data exchange is just about enabling those connections to share the data and making sure there is that break in the middle for the permission.

Hannah: 00:25:57

So there's still quite a good level of control from the farmers.

Adam: 00:26:01

Yeah, absolutely.

And importantly, what it's not doing is sort of taking copies of data, creating a new big central database, which really would put fear into people's hearts. I think it's using what's already out there that farmers.

You know, perhaps farmers have put in a cattle movement into bcms or a pig movement into eml too. They've done that once.

We don't need to have conversations about, you know, where a cow is and how many cows you've got, or, you know, vice versa, across the other sectors. We can just let the farmer have control over where that data is shared.

Hannah: 00:26:35

Yeah. And what do you think would be the most sort of obvious practical benefits from this data exchange?

Adam: 00:26:41

I hope, really. And what we're hearing from, from the farmers we worked with is that the reduction in time from a farmer's point of view is massive.

We think about just the carbon calculation use case, which is not everything, it's just where we focus the proof of concept on and we think about perhaps a typical dairy farmer who's got two enterprises. So they've got their dairy supply chain and they've got a beef supply chain.

At least two different buyers who want kind of the same data, or more or less the same data, but probably in two different ways provided to two different carbon calculators. And a farmer's got to sit there.

This is hours and hours and days and days of effort, let alone if consultants coming down the farm driveway are involved as well. And all of that effort is turned into a few clicks really once, you know, once you've got enough data that you can reuse it.

So we hope that's a major factor. I think the realization of the value of this for farmers is another key one.

So right now a farmer could go to a high street bank and if they were able to provide the types of data that bank is interested in, they could get a preferential loan rate. And that incentive exists right now. There's things around buying contracts as well.

Knowledge based trading and agricultural product plus data is fundamentally worth more than just the product of its own.

Hannah: 00:27:57

I mean, Adam, this feels like a super exciting project. It sounds like there's a lot of potential with this. We talk about it being a proof of concept. What does that sort of actually mean?

And what are the next kind of steps to get this into something that farmers could actually use?

Adam: 00:28:12

Yeah, that's a good question. Proof of concept's a bit of technical jargon in itself really, but a trial, a pilot, it's a proof of concept's almost literal in its definition.

We had some concepts and we wanted to prove them. That's what we've done. So we've built a system, but we've built it quickly and cheaply. I mean, this is where I'll get my plug in.

We've delivered an IT project ahead of schedule and under budget, which is basically unheard of. So credit to the team there because that's quite an achievement. But it's almost throwaway. It's not something you would want to go into live service.

It's not robust enough for that.

So what comes next really is us really taking a good temperature check of farmers of the wider industry, of aligned industries, with government, and working out if this is something AHDB should do and if you feel strongly about this and you're listening to this, do get in touch with hdb because it's the only way we know.

And then we can put together a business case for a live productionized version of the system and start helping farmers and helping all the other actors out. Yeah, for real.

Phil: 00:29:14

We've been talking about running in this week's episode. Have you thought about.

Once you've got this all done and you've solved the problem for farmers, have you thought about doing the same for all these running apps? We have, because I seem to have about 11 on my phone and they don't all speak to each other.

Adam: 00:29:29

I mean, it's a great example, isn't it? I mean, that farming's in exactly the same position, isn't it?

You know, I've got some information in Gatekeeper and I've got some information in Ilivestock and they won't talk to each other and what. Yeah, it'd be the same with. I'm good. I mean, my knowledge of the fitness apps is so out of date now. But Strava's a thing, isn't it?

I only use the Garmin one and my fitness pal now, so I'm totally out the loop. But, yeah, there's the same demand, isn't there? You've just got to.

You've got to find the hook, you've got to find the reason to incentivize these companies to do it.

Phil: 00:29:58

Well, thank you very much, Adam. That's really interesting. To learn more about the Farm Data exchange Project.

Right, we'll be back with Charlotte, the butcher from the Farmer's Dog, to talk some more about Great British Beef Wheat and how she's looking to diversify by developing sportswear for women.

Hannah: 00:31:46

You're listening to the Ag show and on the piece of paper in front of me, I've got a note that says usual plug to get in touch. So there you are. Please get in touch with us. Email address is agshowdb.orguk we always want to hear from you and what's going on. So.

So let's get back in conversation with Charlotte Kingham, head butcher at the Farmer's Dog pub in Oxfordshire. I've actually introduced that with no mention of Jeremy Clarkson or his farm or his TV series.

Phil: 00:32:12

Well done. Well, I'm not sure if it is a well done actually, because you have ended up mentioning Jeremy Clarkson or his farm or his TV series.

Hannah: 00:32:20

Just in case you didn't know.

Phil: 00:32:22

Yeah, just in case you didn't know. There is a connection, but, yeah, back to the serious stuff.

We're talking with Charlotte to coincide with Great British Beef Week, which runs from the 20th, 23rd of April, and we asked Charlotte to tell us about her customers and the sorts of things they.

Charlotte: 00:32:38

Order here at Hots and Shops. We have two very different markets. We have our tourists who come down, obviously on holiday.

We've got a lot of campsites and caravan parks around here. So to them, it's obviously your barbecue packs, breakfast packs, sausages, bacon, burgers and obviously a lot of steaks in the summer.

But in the winter, obviously, we have our local market as well. We have obviously Christmas orders. We've done Valentine's orders this year and we've also done Easter orders, which are very well supported.

But that's where the joints and, you know, the beef Wellingtons sell really well. So it's sort of. It is seasonal as any other butchers, but I think we are just obviously the opposite way around.

But our best seller would probably be, to be honest, probably our sirloin or rib eye steaks and then sausages and then. Yeah, but that's where, again, it links back to the nose tail.

It makes sort of our job a little bit harder in the summer, making sure that we're using up all the joints because obviously not. Not so many people are having their Sunday roast.

Mark: 00:33:30

So.

Hannah: 00:33:31

And that sort of nose to tail ethos and that approach to selling, does that lend itself to a lot of product development? Are you doing anything specific or niche that maybe other butcher shops aren't doing in terms of cuts or products?

Charlotte: 00:33:45

With the 100% British produce, we obviously are limited on the different ingredients we can use. So if you looked at a normal butcher's counter, you'd see a lot of, like, marinated products in, like, your lemon, your pepper barbecue sauce.

You know, obviously it's a challenge for us because we have to find ways to sell the product without using non British products. So we're trying to make our own barbecue sauce that we can do actual barbecue marinated, like kebabs in the summer.

But to be honest, we're sort of like on the product development front, we sort of try and market the different cuts, the maybe less known cuts, more.

Phil: 00:34:20

Talking about cuts, beef specifically, are there any kind of cuts that you think are maybe not particularly fashionable, but are underrated, that we should be thinking about your Bavette steak.

Charlotte: 00:34:33

That is actually a really good seller here. So be your skirt steak. Otherwise known, I'd have that in either sandwiches or a stir fry. Obviously cutting against the grain.

I think that's definitely underrated.

Your omelette steak, also called the hangers steak, which I believe, because I think there's an old sort of myth that butchers take that home for themselves each week. So it's the hanger steak. But that's really tender and cooked right. It's just perfect.

Phil: 00:34:58

Me salivating over that now. Not having a steak tonight, unfortunately. Also just kind of like sticking with the beef theme.

Obviously, we're talking to you because of Great British Beef Week and I know you're a big supporter of it. Why is that? What is it that this specific week means to you?

Charlotte: 00:35:16

I think, especially in sort of today's climate, with all the challenges that farmers are facing, it's so important for us to get behind British agriculture, obviously, especially beef this week.

But to have a whole week dedicated to British beef where all we do is shout about how naturally delicious it is and how brilliant it is, you know, there's no better week. And I think, yeah, having the opportunity to showcase local suppliers that are bringing the goods to our counters.

So, yeah, not just the beef, but the suppliers as well. Yeah, I think it's, yeah, just brilliant.

Hannah: 00:35:48

Now, Charlotte, this is a massive segue, but you mentioned Chris Hoyt earlier. He's a famous sportsman, so I'm gonna segue into some sporting chat.

We talk a lot about diversification in agriculture and of course, butchery and farm shops is one way of doing that. I'm getting there, Bear with me. But I understand you're diversifying yourself into sportswear.

Charlotte: 00:36:10

Yes.

So I've played rugby for the last 11 years and I'm basically fed up that there aren't any, in my opinion, sportswear or rugby wear that is built specifically for women. It's all men's clothes sized down. So I'm currently setting up a women's active sportswear company, specifically rugby built sportswear.

You can wear it for all sports, but specifically rugby.

It's called KNGM Sportswear and I'm really excited to see what I can do with it and, yeah, look at different technologies and different things that hopefully other people haven't yet.

Hannah: 00:36:42

That's wicked. As a former rugby player myself, I can attest to the shorts in particular, not fitting well for a woman. Yeah, they're horrendous.

Phil: 00:36:52

I don't think rugby shorts fit for anyone, do they?

Charlotte: 00:36:55

Yeah, very good point. They're not the most flattering of things, but hopefully I'm going to change the game, so stay tuned.

Hannah: 00:37:02

How can people look at your stuff?

Charlotte: 00:37:05

We've got an Instagram page, KNGM Sportswear. We're also got a website which just put your email in for updates at the moment.

So it's kngmsportswear.com KNGM sounds a bit weird, but it's my last name, but just shortened So I thought it was quite catchy when I did it.

Hannah: 00:37:23

Nice one. Yeah. We'll include some links to that.

Martin: 00:37:26

And Charlotte, before you go, producer Martin here. I just wanted to challenge you, given where you currently work.

There was in our big end of year quiz, Funnily enough, at the end of last year, we had a round called Barnyard Banter where my two girls were describing things connected to farming.

I'd just quite like to see whether you can Channel your inner 4 year old and 9 year old and see whether you can get guess what the two are talking about. There's three sets of clues. Let's see if you can get it on the first set.

Charlotte: 00:37:58

He likes to drink. He looks quite proud of himself.

Martin: 00:38:03

So he likes to drink and he looks quite proud of himself. Who could they be talking about?

Charlotte: 00:38:09

My instinct is obviously along the drinking lines to do with farming. I'm gonna guess Jeremy Clarkson just cause I work here.

Martin: 00:38:18

Okay. Okay. Let's see what the next set of clues bring.

Charlotte: 00:38:20

They're wearing a green coat. They're wearing a white T shirt. They haven't got much hair.

Martin: 00:38:26

Green coat, white T shirt, and they haven't got much hair. Are you sticking with Jeremy Clarkson?

Charlotte: 00:38:31

I don't know. Am I gonna get fired for saying he's got no hair? Is that a bit risky?

Martin: 00:38:37

Well, it's my daughters that are saying it, so don't worry, I'm not putting words in your mouth.

Charlotte: 00:38:41

Could be Caleb as well, though. I don't know. So I think we'll stick with Jeremy for the moment. We'll see what the thing clue brings. He's in the middle of the road.

Behind them is a big field. It's very green. He knows Jeremy Clarkson.

Martin: 00:38:56

Oh, so he knows Jeremy Clarkson. Are you switching your answer?

Charlotte: 00:39:01

Yes. I think it's either gotta be Caleb or. No, I'm gonna go with Caleb.

Martin: 00:39:10

I think Caleb Cooper here is the big reveal.

Charlotte: 00:39:14

It's cheerful, Charlie. Ah, I should have known with the lack of hair, to be honest.

Martin: 00:39:21

Can you clear something up? Because my daughter's obviously said likes to have a drink. We're on about water here. Clearly.

Charlotte: 00:39:30

Yes, yes, definitely likes to drink water. Stay hydrated, kids.

Phil: 00:39:37

It's all that field walking he does, isn't it? He obviously gets really thirsty.

Charlotte: 00:39:42

Yeah.

Hannah: 00:39:44

Well, Phil, that was an excellent episode. I thought it was great to hear from Charlotte and how she's engaging with customers and putting her weight behind Great British Beef Week.

And we even delved into the world of farm data and how our exchange proof of concept can hopefully save people a lot of time and give them control back over their data.

Martin: 00:40:03

We're just going back to the Great British beef Phil. Imagine the successful time that you could get having it in your preparation for your next marathon. I you could go sub 4 with a a nice British steak.

Phil: 00:40:16

I did eat steak before.

Martin: 00:40:17

Eat more of it then.

Phil: 00:40:18

No, you are right. I think more steak, more dairy is is probably the way forward. More lamb, more pork.

I'm just going to have all of it and and plenty of wheat based products as well. I think just chuck it all together. A bit of oil seed rape to cook it. Just job done.

Martin: 00:40:36

I'm gonna go sub 4 the AHDB plan.

Hannah: 00:40:40

See you next week.

Phil: 00:40:41

Bye.