Words by Jane Loughran and photography by Phil Rigby.

Last updated at 11:21, Wednesday, 19 November 2008

Charles Lowther has turned the historic George and Dragon at Clifton near Penrith, into a showcase for produce from his family's estate.

Charles Lowther and his girlfriend Juno Leigh outside the newly refurbished George and Dragon, at Clifton, near Penrith

Charles Lowther took his birthright for granted when he was growing up on his family’s Cumbrian estate. It didn’t really occur to him that there was anything truly special about being able to live off the fat of your own family’s land.
After all, the Lowther estate covers 70,000 acres of prime Cumbrian countryside and the family farm 4,000 acres themselves.
But 30-year-old Charles, the eighth and youngest child of the late James, Earl of Lonsdale, thought his family were missing a trick by not branding their own produce.
In the wake of the 2001 foot and mouth epidemic, Charles returned home from London where he was on the brink of starting a career as a banker in order to help his father who was then aged 79. He arrived back in Cumbria determined to bring a new modern dimension to the running of the estate.
Equipped with a degree in agribusiness and with his childhood experience of working on the land, Charles developed an organic ethos at Lowther Park Farms in 2002. He also took responsibility for the running of his mother’s family estate farms at Nordvue near Armathwaite in the Eden Valley. The estate began selling to a number of local shops including Booths supermarkets, Penrith-based butchers Cranstons and Low Sizergh Farmshop near Kendal.
Now Charles, backed by his mother Caroline, Countess of Lonsdale, has taken a bold new step. With some considerable expense, time, and thought he has turned the George and Dragon at Clifton, near Penrith into a showpiece for produce from the family estate.
The Georgian pub, which has been revamped and upgraded into a smart contemporary country inn, is now serving simple classic dishes which use top-of-the-range organic Lowther meats, game, vegetables and fish.
The George and Dragon is using the estate’s premium free-range chickens and eggs, beef, lamb, pork, and game. Venison is from the red deer on Shap Fell and Heltondale and the roe deer in Lowther’s woodland. Salmon and trout are from the River Lowther and the five-mile stretch of the River Eden which belongs to the estate.
Most of the English side of the Solway Firth belongs to Lowther Estates and Charles is now making links with fishermen from Whitehaven and Maryport. The Lowther family built Georgian Whitehaven in the 1790s in order the export the coal from their West Cumbrian mines to Ireland.
John Turner, the estate’s land agent, along with local fisherman Wilf Morgan has spent the past five years developing a mussel, oyster and cockle farm at Cardurnock on the Solway estuary. Oysters from the farm are now on the menu at the George and Dragon.
Vegetables are from the family’s three quarters of an acre kitchen gardens at Askham, near Penrith where the head gardener is Colin Myers. Again, Charles is planning to increase the size of the estate’s vegetable selection, taking advantage of the fertile soils at both Cliburn and Nordvue.
Right now, two full-time gardeners work in the kitchen gardens which supply the George and Dragon with potatoes, salad leaves, swedes, broccoli, leeks, carrots and artichokes. Strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, wild berries and rhubarb also grow in the gardens. “We will increase the range of fruits and vegetables to meet demand,’’ adds Charles.
In time, more produce will come from the estate’s tenants. Beef is also supplied by Charles’s cousin, Tom Lowther, who rears Longhorn cattle at Whitbysteads, Askham. Tom’s traditionally bred mutton is also on the menu. Game is from the estate’s woodlands and shoots as well as from local businessman Alan Jenkinson from Whinfell Park who owns a shoot.
All the meats and game is packed and processed at Saddleback Foods, a farm run by Mark Atkinson at Plumpton.
However, when it comes to the cheese course, Charles admits defeat. With not a single supplier on the Lowther Estate, the George and Dragon, which seats 110 diners inside and another 40 outside, has turned to Thornby Moor dairy at Crofton Hall near Thursby, Carlisle.
The bar serves beer from Cumbrian micro-breweries at Hesket Newmarket and Tirril as well as catering for non-drinkers with a locally made elderflower cordial, traditional lemonade, real teas and coffees.
Head chef at the swanky renovated pub is Paul McKinnon who previously worked at Michelin-starred Newcastle restaurant 21 Queen Street; he also worked for five years at St James Park, Newcastle catering for expensive corporate entertainment.
Paul’s culinary philosophy is that 95 per cent of good cooking is using the best produce. “The food here is simple. I want the taste to do the talking. If I serve burger and chips, it means quality meat and potatoes,’’ he says.
Charles was helped with the interior design of the George and Dragon by his mother, and by his girlfriend, artist Juno Leigh. Traditional Cumbrian materials, sympathetic to the local architecture, have been used wherever possible. The locally aged oak bar was supplied by Middleton’s, the Appleby building and joinery company; the outside stone walls were created from Lowther estate stone by Ben Jackson who is the son of a tenant farmer. Natural slate flooring is from a company owned by Steve Alderman in the remote Mallerstang valley near Kirkby Stephen.
Local craftsmen worked hard to create the comfortable interior which manages to be both contemporary and traditional. Despite an extension being added to the original pub, Charles has reduced the number of bedrooms to create 10 spacious en suite rooms, painted in Farrer & Ball colours, and each with an estate theme.
Even the photographs and pictures on the walls are all relevant to the Lowther estate. Old photographs of the estate from the Lowther family albums sit alongside new pictures shot by photographers Val Corbett, who lives near Askham, and Stuart Clarke, who lives in an estate house in the Eden Valley.
The George and Dragon has a fantastic history which might act as an inspiration for artists. Clifton Moor was the scene of the last battle to be fought on English soil when the Duke of Cumberland’s forces clashed with Bonnie Prince Charlie’s retreating Jacobite rebels on December 18, 1745.
A dozen Highlanders, mainly Macphersons, were killed and are all buried under the huge oak tree which still stands behind the pub and which is named the Rebel Tree. A couple of years ago, a plaque was unveiled in the pub’s rear garden. It is a bizarre coincidence that Caroline, Countess of Lowther is a Macpherson on her maternal side.
More recently, three generations of the Schoefield family owned the George and Dragon while also working on the Lowther Estate as gardeners and flower-growers, before selling 20 years ago to Arthur Bainbridge, the last owner before Charles.
The history of the George and Dragon and its links with the Lowther Estate are a huge attraction for Charles. “My family has a thousand years of history in this area and I’ve grown to respect that. I have become aware of how many hard-working farmers and others over the years have depended on the Lowthers for employment.
“I would like to think that the George and Dragon is a shop window for Lowther tenants as well as for my own family,’’ says Charles.
 The George and Dragon’s official opening is on Thursday, September 18. It will be open every day except Mondays. Lunch from 12-2pm and dinner from 6-9.30pm. Bar snacks throughout the afternoons.

First published at 10:32, Wednesday, 01 October 2008
Published by http://www.cumbrialife.co.uk