29 Feb 2012
TV presenter Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has praised the “Blitz spirit” of his co-workers and neighbours for getting his River Cottage headquarters in Devon operating again after it was damaged in a fire.
The celebrity chef’s cookery building suffered in the fire at Park Farm, near Axminster on February 7.
The damage suffered by the 400-year-old building included the destruction of the restored barn roof. Ten ovens connected to gas cylinders in the kitchen were also involved.
Fearnley-Whittingstall, who was away filming in the Southern Ocean at the time, said the damage was “extraordinary, devastating, beyond what I had imagined”.
But he arrived back in the UK at the weekend and welcomed guests at the school which reopened in a temporary “field kitchen”.
Copyright Press Association 2012