Welcome and thank you for reading our letter and visiting this page.  Our family set up Somerset Farm Direct in 1999 when lamb prices were particularly low, we were faced with a situation where we had to get a better price for our lambs or go out of farming.  Since then we have slowly built up a loyal following of over 3000 customers which has also enabled us to buy lambs from several of our neighbours  who are only too happy to supply us as we pay them a decent price - regardless of what the market may be doing.  Our aim is to try and create an outlet for half of the lambs produced by the 9 farms (which includes our own) that supply our business.  That equates to about 1,500 lambs a year.

We do not have a farm shop (there is very little passing traffic on the edge of Exmoor) and we do not attend farmers markets as we don't think we would have enough time to do so and run a mail order business and a farm as well.  What we do is sell our lambs in whole, half or quarter lamb packs, we are aware that for people that have not bought in this way before the idea may sound daunting.  They may not know what to do with some of the cuts, or perhaps believe that they will be eating roast lamb for months and they might think they don't have the 'fridge or freezer space.  By compiling a good database of recipes we aim to show that lamb can in fact be extremely versatile, that having a conveniently butchered half lamb in the freezer might just be an alternative to having a freezer full of ready meals.  

As a family, we all love food, both cooking and eating, and we have a fairly extensive range of cookery books.  Having looked through all of these books for various lamb recipes it became apparent that the average book contained only two or three recipes for lamb, many of them for roasting a leg or shoulder.  It is because of this relative scarcity of lamb recipes that we feel collecting an exciting and extensive range of recipes is a worthwhile project.   

Below are 6 recipes and their authors, click on any of them to have a look at the sample recipe pages.  As you will see, on each of the pages below the recipe there is information about the author and any appropriate links; to their restaurants, their own websites or an online shop where current books can be purchased and future publications pre-ordered.

All recipes have been provided by kind permission of their authors and are protected under standard copyright law.

Sarah Connolly, Elliot Ketley, Des McDonald, Ruth Rogers, Mark Dodson, Mark Emmerson, Raymond Blac, David Eyre, Tessa Bramley, Shaun Hill, Bruno Loubet, Mark Hix, Heston Bluhmental, Giorgio Locatelli, Peter Gorton, Antony Worral Thompson, Paul Firmin, Michel Roux, Mr and Mrs Sam Clark, Mark Edwards, Theodore Kyriakou, Paul Heathcote, Rose Gray, David Thompson, Mourad Mazouz, Richard Corrigan, Aaron Patterson, William Drabble, Nick Bell, Bruce Poole, Pascal Aussignac, Anthony Boyd, Alan Bird, Matin Caws, Tim Hughes, Philip Howard, Ollie Couillaud, Darren Bunn, Hywel Jone, Ken Whitehead, Winston Matthews, Gary Hollihead, Valerio Daros, Jason Gladwin, Jose Cau, Kevin Mangeolles, Michel Perraud, Dick and Kay Smith, Ramon Farthing, Nick Craft, Matthew Prowse, Patrick Roberts, Andrew Nutter, Jeremy Ashpool, Damian Broom, Adam Fellows, Marcus Ashenford, Jamie Oliver, Jane Grigson, Simon Radley, Pierre Cheviallard, Eric Chavot, Marion Jones, Martin Blunos, Keith Marshall, Darren Prideaux, Michael Caines, Wayne Vickerage, Mark Wilkinson, Michael Wignall, Mark Raffan, Christopher Randle-Bissell, Mitchel Hill, Simon Arkless, Steve Martin, Andrew McPherson, Chris Blaydes, Daniel Galmiche, Jonathan Wright, Alex Atiken, Ben Streak, Ian Bravey, Toby Hill, Robin Zavou, Jean-Mark Zanetti, Susan Elliott, Galton Blackiston, Nigel Haworth, Kevin Barron, Christina Bricknell-Webb, Marcus Wareing, Simon Shaw, Anthony Demetre, David Pitchford, Kenneth Wilson, Chris Kewley, Gerad Roser, Lui Hollomby, David Chambers, Graeme Nesbitt, Jason Gladwin, Jonnie Martin, Colin Akrigg, Alison St Quintin, Greg Laskey, Jason Davenport, Patrick Pierre Tweedie, Peter Hauser, John Rudden, Peter Robinson, Peter Dixon, Nigella Lawson, Germain Schwab, Harry Yeung, Frances Aitkins, Vineet Bhatia, Nino Saussu, Chris Galvin, Ian Wood, John Torode, Terrence Conran, Valentina Harris, Tamasin Day-Lewis, Alatair Hendy, Graham Kerr, Ken Hom, Phil Vickery, Rick Stein, Hugh Fearnly-Whittingstall, Henrietta Green, Fran Warde, Nigel Slater, Jill Gordan, Jane Clarke, Amanda Grant, Rowley Leigh, Claire Macdonald, Heather French, Garry Rhodes, Delia Smith, Dean Carr, Robert Clayton, Emma Sexton, Thierry Le Pretre-Granet, David Jones, Richard Guest, Steve Williams, David Selex, Billy Reid, Tony Blair, John Humphries, Ray Mears, John Craven