Experience Cotna more fully with our Inspired by Nature courses in the kitchen or on the land. Or treat yourself or friends & family with holistic therapies in our roundhouse to help you relax, recharge and make the most of your time here. Vouchers available for experiences below:
Sourdough Bread made Easy Course Vouchers
All seasons
Sara learned sourdough bread making with Vicky’s Bread, who supply bread from Helston to all over Cornwall. Since then she has baked nearly every day & has developed a simple, reliable approach to making all kinds of delicious loaves. Learn the different stages of sourdough baking throughout the day, then eat your own loaf, warm out of the oven, for breakfast the next morning. Back home you will be ready to get going the very next day with your starter levain mix, a Banneton basket & a recipe to follow – you’ll never look back!
Vouchers for this course: £50 (1 person), £95 (two people). Get in touch to buy your vouchers
Knead and be Kneaded – Sourdough and Massage day Vouchers
Feel nurtured and creative. Learn the secrets of sourdough with a hands-on bread making class; while you wait for the dough to rise, enjoy a deep relaxing massage treatment! By the end of the day you will have baked your own loaf, feel more grounded and relaxed and go away with all you need to get baking yourself.
Vouchers for this course: £95 per person Get in touch to buy your voucher
Get in touch to buy your vouchers
Cotna meets Kerala (South India) Course Vouchers
All seasons
Cornwall has traded tin around the world for centuries, in return for goods & spices like saffron. Even the local village of Tregony had a row of spice and silk shops backalong before the River Fal silted up. Sara has visited Kerala, South India, many times and finds it fascinating that Cochin (at the centre of the spice trade) would have shipped spices to Cornwall. So it seems appropriate that South Indian cooking has had such an influence on Cotna cuisine. Keralan recipes are simple to cook and delicious once you know how to combine Indian spices or coconut with seasonal vegetables we grow here – and chillies do grow well in the poly tunnels. With some basic ideas and practice together, you will be able to go home with the confidence to cook healthy and exotic tasting vegetarian meals like brussel sprout thoran, tomato & ginger fry or butternut squash dahl.
Vouchers for this course: £50 (1 person), £95 (two people). Get in touch to buy your vouchers
Walk on the Wild Side Course Vouchers
Spring & Autumn
Walk the Cotna circuit around the 12 acre valley with Sara & Dave, foraging wild seasonal food as we go. Learn to identify foods in our hedgerows, woodland & fields. After foraging, spend a couple of hours cooking up a creative meal in the kitchen with Sara, then sit down to a delicious feast together with us in the farmhouse – accompanied by Dave’s cider of course! You will take home ideas and recipes for dishes like pennywort canapés, fresh nettle tortellini with wild garlic butter, alexander risotto, flower & micro leaf salad, comfrey shoot curry, sloe chocolate or cleavers ice-cream.
Vouchers for this course: £50 (1 person), £95 (two people). Get in touch to buy your vouchers
Preserving Nature’s Bounty Course Vouchers
All seasons
Back before freezers we had to be much more creative to preserve the bounties of summer & autumn. The traditional ways would have used salt, sugar, vinegar or smoke. Using some of these methods with our seasonal ingredients, we will cook up a whole range of jams, chutneys, pickles vinegars & cordials. Fermentation has become increasingly popular and Sara is starting to experiment with that too! So go home with ideas and jarfuls for yourselves, friends & family to enjoy. This course can combine well with the sourdough bread making session, while waiting for the bread to rise.
Vouchers for this course: £50 (1 person), £95 (two people). Get in touch to buy your vouchers
No Dig Gardening Course Vouchers
Spring, Summer, Autumn
We started by growing & selling our organic wild watercress & rocket, then moved on to other salad leaves – mainly all kinds of lettuce but also purslane, mustard, chicory, raddiccio, red orache & Japanese chrysanthiums. We follow the inspiration of the no-dig gardening guru Charles Dowding, and like him we deliver to restaurants, cafes & farmshops locally. Spend an afternoon with us in the garden, learning how we move from creating compost to sowing seeds and potting on, then to planting out & harvesting. Feel inspired to go home and use the no-dig approach to sowing, growing, mulching & composting!
Vouchers for this course: £30 (1 person). Get in touch to buy your vouchers