The first (Escape to) River Cottage started in 1998 and in my opinion, was the best. It is one of my favourite programs and a couple of Christmas' ago, I spent a whole day watching the repeats on television.
The Original Victorian cottage in an idyllic location with a stream passing the door and set in the middle of the Devon countryside.
It was everyone's dream and the atmospherics of the location, coupled with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's easy to listen to voice made it great viewing.
Little did we all know but it was probably the start of a self sufficiency revolution. Today, especially with the financial crisis making us all think about what we spend, got hoards of people are looking for land on which to start their own produce for the table.
River Cottage isn't just the name of a location, today it is an extremely well known brand that has spawned all kinds of spin-offs.
Hugh is leveraging his popularity combined with his love for ethical food production to help people find land that others are not in a position to use.
The scheme is called Landshare - this is how it is described on the Landshare website:
"With allotment waiting lists massively over-subscribed and people right across the country keener than ever to grow their own fruit and veg, the aim for Landshare is to become a UK wide initiative to make British land more productive and fresh local produce more accessible to all. But all of this depends on people like you registering their interest now."
It is not a new idea by any means but not everyone has the same media options available to them as the River Cottage team.
River Cottage has also set up a new interactive network for its members to upload photos and recipes and write blogs about their exploits.
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