Hyper- sustainably driven Cornish pub set to open in June
Jeffrey Robinson, one of the UK’s first chefs to have attained a green Michelin star, has announced his new Cornish outpost – Harbour House – will be opening in late June.
Set on the waterfront in the historic village of Flushing, on the South Cornish coast, Harbour House will be a pub that is dedicated to creating and achieving new levels of hyper-sustainability in the hospitality industry.
For the past few years, Jeffrey has helmed the New Yard Restaurant, with his wife Caroline, on the Lizard Peninsula in rural southwest Cornwall. It is here that Jeffrey began his journey into not only honing his dishes, but his deep core understanding of how the produce was grown. His journey, with his talented team, onto the new pub establishment in Flushing marks a distinct evolution for the historic waterfront property, formerly known as The Seven Stars.
Jeffrey and the team will be throwing open the pub doors in late June, inviting lunch and dinner dining guests, and in-between pub snacks and small plates, with an array of dishes that showcase the freshest of produce from the surrounding sea, rivers, fields and gardens. Daily producers and suppliers will include New Dawn Traders, Sailor’s Creek Shellfish and Soul Food Farm, an organic, regeneratively led market garden. All cooking at Harbour House will be over coals from Tom Kemp of Working Woodlands Cornwall, the only eco-sustainable supplier in the entire country, who use local coppice sourced from surrounding woods.
Harbour House will also pour the very best of hyper-local beers from Penryn’s Verdant Brewer, Lacuna, who are making headways with the local sourcing of their hops. Cornish made gins and spirits will be supplied from Loveday, Pocket Full of Stones and other local producers. Jeffrey has a key relationship with David Berwick from St Ives Cider who made their cider for New Yard, one that was up for the World Cider Awards and will now be doing the same for Harbour House.
The wine list has been carefully curated using minimal intervention, bio dynamic and organic wines with Ben Mudditt from Wanderlust Wines. Ben has been working with Jeffrey for many years and understands his food style and what wines pair impeccably with this cuisine.
Pub rooms, all with charming sea views, will be added upstairs in the coming months with these expected to open in winter 2023.
The village of Flushing is set on the Penryn River, directly across from Falmouth, offering the perfect home for a closed loop system where a hospitality business can thrive but be under pinned with not only environmental but social accountability, a foundation Jeffrey believes is essential if you wish to market yourself as ‘sustainable’.
The establishment’s new name: Harbour House honours the centuries-long history of marine trading Flushing, its seafaring traditions and the building’s former use as board and lodging for Dutch shipping crews. The freehouse property is currently being stripped and reshaped, releasing previously unmet potential space and storytelling layers as they go.
Cornish boy Jeffrey was one of the first chefs in the world to achieve a Green Michelin Star, one of the most sought-after and forward-thinking awards to be recognised for. In addition, Jeffrey has received 3 rosettes and numerous other awards for creativity, innovation and sustainable practises. Starting the rounds in the St Ives restaurant scene, he left to work in Bath, Bristol and London before returning to eventually head up The New Yard Restaurant and Pantry with his wife Caroline on the Cornish Lizard Peninsula.
Jeffrey led the philosophy, the standards and the team at New Yard, finding and training a talented team just as dedicated as he was to serving food from their own walled garden, food grown using permaculture and no dig methods, alongside truly local line caught fish and pasture fed Cornish meats.
Changing the restaurant’s approach to how they sold their experience was a bold move. As they grew a significant amount of the food themselves, they worked with small, independent, hyper-local producers who provided them with what was abundant on that particular day. This meant that they were unable to give advance notice of what the New Yard dining room would be enjoying, until 7pm when everyone was already seated.
But by putting their faith in the local fisherman and farmers, and in the soil they grew from, the New Yard team brought their customers on the journey with them. With the help of wonderful talks and explanations from the people who actually created what they were eating, New Yard gained renown as a passionate, educational dining experience.
Jeffrey Robinson reflects, “At New Yard, it was not only the organic, regenerative farming methods used by ourselves and our suppliers, it was the move of taking away the menus in 2020 that really made the difference. This forced the creativity into my team and I every single day. We had to come in fresh and ready to re-create an experience that was not available yesterday, that wouldn’t be available tomorrow – but that was absolutely created for this very one lunch dinner service.”
Jeffrey says, “I can’t wait to throw open the doors of Harbour House, and to bring all of our learnings with us to this utterly idyllic, shoreline pub setting. We’ll be using produce from the top of the hill in Flushing, seafood harvested right outside the front door and imports delivered by sail boat. By allowing forward thinking farmers from Cornwall to dictate my menus, I will be honouring how previous generations sourced and traded ingredients from this very location. We’ll be offering a dining experience that is obviously my signature, but in an affordable way. This means we can continue to support the local community, local producers and also means we can create year round positions for my invaluable and dedicated team.”
Jeffrey continues, “’Sustainable’ is an umbrella term that perhaps isn’t policed as much as it should be. But for me and my team, true sustainability is our daily graft and craft, and it’s evident in every ingredient, and every single decision we make as a business. We will be deeply applying ourselves from the minute we open the doors in late June, ensuring Harbour House is at the forefront of the industry for years to come.”
