The Wild Rabbit

The first meal of my birthday road trip took us to the village of Kingham where we were booked to stay and dine at the Wild Rabbit. I had thankfully made the booking way back in September before the announcement of the Michelin Guide 2017, where unsurprisingly, they were awarded a star. Since the award of the star, both the restaurant and the accommodation have been fully booked until January. The chef here is Tim Allen who was previously at Launceston Place which used to be a favourite of my wife when he was cooking there for 4 years.

“Can I have some of the vegetable curry”, said the man next to me at the Farmers’ Market. The voice sounded familiar. “Oh and some of the rice too, please”. I looked sideways. It was David Cameron. I suppose I was asking for it, hovering round the Farmers’ Market on a Saturday morning in Chipping Norton. The Prime Minister and I had a brief conversation (of course we did, as if I was going to stay quiet)  the details of which I won’t share, otherwise I might have to kill you. Yet again I find myself in the North Oxfordshire countryside,  not, for once, to use the Daylesford mothership meeting-spot but to go to nearby Kingham, picture-postcard pretty, an estate-agent’s dream and only 90 minutes from Paddington, in case you were wondering.  Daylesford is of course Daylesford Organic; the brainchild of Carole Bamford, entrepreneur and wife of Anthony, king of the JCB digger. For someone who presumably can use The Haybarn Spa at Daylesford whenever she likes, Mrs Bamford always seems quite stressed. I am in the area to meet R, with whom I recently hooked up at a networking event called The Purple Beach; a far cry from the turgid legal conferences I am forced to attend when I haven’t made up my Continuing Professional Education points and which are otherwise known as money for old rope. R is a local and has suggested The Wild Rabbit, about which I know little,  other than it is owned by Carole Bamford.  It strikes me as the lovechild of Daylesford and OKA, that furniture empire run by Sam Cam’s mother. OKA is aspirational, pastiche country-house furniture. I would be surprised if Lady Astor has it scattered around her home. This is a pub in the same way that Fortnum and Mason is a supermarket. It’s a pub for men who wear red trousers and see nothing wrong with that...