Ballintaggart - Where Scotland Grows

On a Perthshire hillside, where moody glens spill onto wildflower meadows, the gastronomic hideaway Ballintaggart showcases the best of the Highlands’ natural larder in its cookery school, bed and breakfast, and award-winning restaurant.

Stalks of fennel, kale and artichoke bob in the breeze in a boxed kitchen garden. Stretching as far as the eye can see are wild, tangled hedgerows, and there’s a fruit orchard dangling apples and plums. Babbling chickens bustle on the fringes of a vast wildflower meadow, 11 acres of grasses, buttercups and ox eye daisies that segues into lower Highlands hills. A collection of stone farmhouse buildings squats among it all on a panoramic perch, enjoying the late autumn sun that bathes the south-facing slope in gold. This is Ballintaggart, a gastronomic nook in Perthshire’s Tay Valley.

The farm opened as a cookery school with rooms in 2016, after brothers Andrew and Chris and Chris’s ex-wife Rachel took the “surreal and magical” step of moving from West London to Perthshire, where they had enjoyed holidaying for years. The plan was to set up with just two rooms and The Cook School. “We noticed a brilliant opportunity as there wasn’t a similar offer outside of Edinburgh,” explains Rachel. Six months after they moved, The Grandtully Hotel in the nearby village of the same name came onto the market and their business quickly expanded by another eight rooms. “We also have dog-friendly accommodation at East End Cottage just two minutes from Ballintaggart Farm,” says Rachel.

All the farm accommodation, currently available for rent on an exclusive basis, is done out in achingly lovely simple styling, with muted neutrals in wood and iron, and linen, tweed and gingham complementing traditional stonework and tiling. Rooms come with freshly baked cookies and complimentary Negroni, and there are outdoor fire pits on the terraces. The Grandtully Hotel, whose elegant restaurant has two AA rosettes, is design-led and fun, with bright tiled walls and a whisky lounge styled in mustard and turquoise.

The hotel neighbours the award-winning master chocolatier Iain Burnett, which is fitting, because food is what Ballintaggart is all about. There’s an emphasis on the local, with anything they can’t produce themselves provided by small regional suppliers including Dugarthill Walled Garden, Little Trochry Farm, The Wright Root and Brian Grant The Strawberry Man. At breakfast guests might expect house-made granola, sourdough with blackberry and bay preserve, and slow scrambled eggs with Dunkeld smoked salmon and kitchen garden kale. Non-residents can enjoy the restaurant, bar and a taster of the farm on Feast Nights throughout the year.

The cookery masterclasses, held in Ballintaggart Farm, range from foraging and meat and game all the way to seasonal suppers and Christmas canapés. “The days start with demonstrations and then the chance to practice skills individually under the watchful eye of our chefs,” explains Rachel. “There’s a leisurely but indulgent lunch, lots of opportunities for questions and tips, and chance to shop at the end too – stocking up on some of our favourite ingredients and equipment.”