ETTC 24 Sep

valley in the middle of france but in fact it's much closer to home find out where i am in just a moment rolling hills and dales a lighthouse standing tall on a rocky outcrop then a thatched cottage reflected in a tranquil stream escape to the country presented by alastair appleton today's house hunters are laying all their cards on the table the dining room might be a bit small we've got quite a big square table so you're going to buy a house around your dining table so will any of our properties reveal a winning hand look at the character just like this fireplace i mean this is just perfect country cottage keep going keep going it's going to break he's got his rosy tinted glasses on i can see that today i'm in buckinghamshire and this is wadston manor just outside of aylesbury now until 1874 this was just a simple hill in empty farmland and then enter baron ferdinand rothschild who bought the 165-acre plot and set about building this fantastical french chateau to entertain his victorian high society friends nowadays the guest list extends to hundreds of thousands of visitors who come to enjoy the house and the gardens and acres and acres of beautiful buckinghamshire one of england's home counties buckinghamshire borders greater london to the south east the county's southern section is dominated by the chalk escarpment of the chilton hills much of which is designated an area of outstanding natural beauty but as well as pretty pastoral views the county boasts more national trust properties than any other including the magnificent clifton house and gardens located above the banks of the river thames also in the care of the national trust is the historic village of west wickham here it's possible to take a stroll along a high street lined with cottages and inns dating from the 16th to the 18th centuries before climbing west wickham hill for magnificent views this is the site of the impressive 18th century west wickham house featuring architectural styles from early palladian to neoclassical and built for sir francis dashwood but as well as these monuments to the wealthy elite buckinghamshire is replete with historic churches built to serve the village congregations at lillingston level st mary's retained some early 13th century features as does the church of saint nicholas at nearby lillingston daryl although this was largely restored in the 19th century after falling into disrepair so if you're looking for a slice of classic english country life packed with centuries old villages and architectural gems buckinghamshire is certainly a county to head to just last week the average uk detached house price hit a record high of 300 000 pounds that's a 50 increase in the last decade and here in buckinghamshire the figures are also quite striking the average here is 625 000 pounds that's more than double the uk figure that is in part explained by beautiful countryside and also the proximity to london but as always the further north in the county you go away from the capital the further your money goes so let's meet the couple who have chosen to make buckinghamshire their home today's buyers are recent cathy who are currently living in rented accommodation on the outskirts of reading in berkshire after relocating with their two sons from south africa a few months ago i came over in september last year to get the boys into school and reese followed through permanently in november we didn't want to rush into buying a house where we immediately landed in the uk we wanted to spend some time looking around finding a place that really suited us born and bred brit rhys who emigrated in the 1990s has fond memories of the uk but for kathy who moved to south africa from scotland when she was just two years old it's all new now they've spent some time getting familiar with life here they're ready for a more rural setting the reason that we want to move away from reading is because the intention was always to try and find somewhere rurally i grew up in a town i really don't live in a town i'm remembering summers when i was younger and i continued to tell my friends in south africa that there's nothing nicer than a summer's evening in in rural england especially if there's a pub nearby for kathy it's about finally finding somewhere the family can settle into british life i'm really looking forward to finding a place in the countryside finding that perfect house and spreading our roots and just settling down we have two boys adam's the eldest he's 14. scott's the youngest 10. i think they're also looking forward to moving into their own house with their own bedrooms that we can finally get out all their things and just settling into their daily life making new friends when it comes to making their country move there are two other important members of the family to consider in 1995 i bought a triumph stag always wanted one ever since i was a little boy and i'm really looking forward to taking out on the open roads driving it through the countryside through those little leafy lanes with the top down stopping at a pub for a pint we have a little jack russell coco who's just the best dog in the whole wide world it's it's almost like having another child well for kathy yes she loves to go for a walk and we like talk with a dog so you know nice leafy country lanes walking through fields footpaths all those sorts of things i don't quite know how she's going to handle seeing all the squirrels and rabbits with two sons a dog a classic car and reese's job for a technology company in west london to consider there's only one county they have their eye on we're looking to move to the buckinghamshire area we think it's going to give us the balance of what we're looking for in terms of location and proximity to where i work the lifestyle is quite different moving from south africa to here never mind just moving into the countryside i think it's just moving to a whole new country it's a it's a massive move for us but it's a challenge and it's going to be fun yeah yes buckinghamshire reese and kathy are open to living anywhere in bucks within commuting distance of reese's work in west london but before we start looking at houses we're meeting up in their chosen county to discuss what they want from the move welcome to buckinghamshire thank you when was the last time you actually bought property on the uk market it would have been about 1989 wow so the the market has changed a lot then and uh tell me about your wishes because it's quite extensive for me uh i'll be working from home some of the time so it's important to have a nice study um i love fires so a nice fireplace uh is is important for me too and a double garage for the car that we've brought with us what about you kathy what's on your wish list ideally four bedrooms um i'd like a nice large kitchen probably three reception rooms if possible that's quite a wish list in terms of space is there any any room for compromise for the right house we'd compromise on on anything really to be honest with you none of it is really cast in stone we've brought a lot of our furniture over with us so ideally we'd like to keep as much of it as we can so how much stuff did you bring from south africa ah two container loads two containers i probably should have sold a bit more before we moved in terms of uh you know choosing a house together i get the impression that you're not so keen on the kind of little kind of cottagey things but i've got the pressure that you might like that i don't mind nooks and crannies um more open space yeah um so that that might be a challenge that we have to get through it's just as long as like the windows aren't these pokey little things that you barely get a bead of light coming through in terms of your budget remind us again of how much money we have to spend absolute maximum is seven hundred thousand pounds a lot of the viewers who watch the show regularly go buckinghamshire oh yeah well i'm naive when it comes to buckingham we wanted to set your challenge yeah well i hope hopefully we have risen to the challenge and that you'll love some of the projects got some lovely properties and uh the rain looks like it's easing off a bit so shall we head out and see them for a maximum budget of seven hundred thousand pounds recent cathy would like a large kitchen three reception rooms a home office and four bedrooms a double garage and dog friendly garden are desirable and whilst rhys likes nooks and crannies kathy is after clean lines and bright spaces so quite a demanding wish list but we found three great properties to tempt them with at each i'll be getting them to guess the price before i reveal it and the final tour is our mystery house which could just polarize opinion driving along a country lane our search is starting on the outskirts of stowe a civil parish famous for an independent school of the same name with the hamlet of chatmore located a couple of miles away once lined with timber-framed thatched cottages just two remain but there are still plenty of the leafy lanes rhys is looking forward to exploring in his classic car as well as a traditional country pub back on the outskirts of stowe the house we've come to see is located down another country lane and holds a rather horsey history here we have it house number one wow okay it's uh the stables of the much bigger manor house just over there okay brilliant what a fantastic area we're right next to stowe school and is one of the finest schools in the country and this i think is a charming property what do you think of the outside like the brickwork yeah faster works really nice nice color looks very nice on the outside i can i can i can tell you that a little bird tells me the units are keen on conversions historically i've i've not been a fan you know maybe maybe there's there's room for someone to convert him yet convert him to conversion yes absolutely that will happen yeah should we go inside let's do that the building of this former menorial stable block dates back to the 19th century but it was converted to a home 20 years ago it retained some period features including its clock tower complete with bells but it's clear the interior is more about the clean lines kathy has asked for [Music] here we have a nice kitchen kitchen the inside of the property is very beautifully made this is a totally bespoke kitchen there isn't a handle anywhere i love the stone tiles yeah i like that it's a lovely feature yeah that's definitely the sort of effect we're looking for and then you've got a nice little utility room there with all your white goods your washing machine there's another door so you could bring him with coco yeah clean her paws yes she does get muddy it's kind of the spec we were looking for you know older style house with a modernish interior is it bright and big enough for you it is a very nice bright kitchen thank you very much let's look at some of the other reception rooms back across the hall and past a useful cloakroom the dining room includes the home's feature staircase come straight through so you've got the dining area here and then this big big living space do you like the fireplace yeah i like the fireplace you wanted modern interiors this is actually very sleek and modern yeah that's very nice i like the uh the amount of light coming through the double doors there leading to the garden in terms of size is this going to be enough i'm concerned that the dining room might be a bit small we've got quite a big square table yeah we'll have to see whether that'll fit in um so you're going to buy a house around your dining table well there's certain furniture that we we won't compromise on and that's and that is one of them yeah yeah so when you said three reception news you meant the kitchen dinos one no we had two lounges so we've got two furniture suites so um she might have to scale that down we might have to scale it down yes reese and kathy may need a little readjusting to the typical dimensions of british country living the central feature staircase splits to give access to two upper wings in the eaves of the house one side is the family bathroom which serves a bedroom currently used as a single but large enough to accommodate a double bed and a further small bedroom the third bedroom on this wing is a good size and has ensuite facilities then over on the other wing we're checking out the largest bedroom this is the master suite with a little shower room here and then that's the actual door that goes up into the clock tower if you're brave enough to take that chance oh really oh okay bit cobwebby i like the way it's split i like the way they've got the divide and the staircase up and it's so you kind of have children that obviously has a benefit yeah it's got a high airy feeling right everything is at a decent level that you're not going to be ducking you don't feel like you're in the attic an upbeat finish to the layout of this converted stable block and outside there's the double garage rhys has asked for as well as off street parking for six cars leading out from the largest reception room there's patio dining plus some mature shrubs and trees surrounding the garden which is mainly lawn it's it's not a huge garden but they got the impression that you're not such a mad king gardener you want a huge garden that's right i mean a smaller garden where we could spend the same amount of time in but do more with it's probably what we're looking for so less time mowing the lawn more time you know beautifying the garden getting some nice flowers in that sort of thing what do you think this one's on the market for i think up near the top end of the budget i think around about six eight five i think kathy's pretty pretty well on the mark with that about 685 maybe a touch higher he likes to agree with me well yes you're right it is actually up towards the top of your budget but actually even higher it's right at the top at seven hundred thousand right okay okay why don't you have another look inside see whether it kind of enchants you uh and then we'll go and see the next property yeah we'll do that i mean it's a lovely house but you know maybe a bit squishy for two container loads of south african furniture but um that's the price of property in this very lovely part of the world so let's see what they think this converted stable block combines a period exterior with modern living there's a bespoke kitchen breakfast room and two further reception rooms whilst upstairs there are four bedrooms two with ensuite bathrooms outside offers a double garage and gardens in a secluded country location what do you think that's very nice i do like the wood i love exposed wood the house is absolutely lovely it's got a nice light airy feel to it there are elements that i really like i think the kitchen's a great kitchen the sort of thing we're looking for i love the stonework on the floor i think the clock tower is a fantastic feature the bedrooms lovely but the small bedroom is really really small and i can see a big argument between my two boys as to who would get the en-suite shower and who wouldn't overall i think the house is just a little a little small for what we're trying to try to get to slightly damp but beautiful gardens maybe not for them all right guys hey yeah are you done yes great cathy you pulled the door we're going to head on to the next house ready let's do that from purple flowers to a field of yellow rapeseed as in many parts of the uk bright yellow fields of oil seed rape flowers are now a familiar part of buckinghamshire's summer patchwork it's likely the plant was first brought here by the romans and used in the middle ages as a soil improver the steam engines of the industrial revolution were kept well lubricated with its oil but for all those centuries a naturally occurring acid made the plant poisonous and unpalatable for humans then in the 1970s canadian scientists developed an edible strain and canola standing for canadian oil low acid was born in the 1980s subsidies encouraged many european farmers to switch to the crop and at one such farm sixth generation farmer simon mead is going to show reese and keen cook kathy the process from soil to [Music] i've oil here since 1850s i've been farming since i've left school and but it wasn't until the 80s that we started growing all seed rape what's the growing process does it grow all year round well it starts its life in august they been the grand already nine months it's at the pollination stage at the moment so all the pods are being formed and we've got another two months to go before we harvest it some people think it's a flower that we get the oil from in but in fact the flower gets pollinated and produces these pods and in these pods there's some seeds and it's the seeds that we get the oil from british production of oil seed rape has doubled in the last decade alone making it such a common sight that during the flowering season coach loads of tourists regularly stop off to aim their selfie sticks at our canary colored fields if you look at the label of low-cost vegetable oil chances are you'll see it's rapeseed it's the artisan single estate cold pressed varieties that really get those gastronomic tongues wagging cold pressing is an extraction process that keeps the heat below 40 degrees celsius and it can be done by hand but here a machine uses high pressure to literally squeeze the oil from the seed there's still lots of sediment in the oil once it comes off the press but in here it passes through the filter and all the little particulates stay in the filter and we're left with something like this wow the cleaned oil is then bottled at a rate of up to two thousand bottles a day come on speed up okay oh is it all right okay these guys are good a pourer and threaded cap are added to the top of each marvelous all down and finally a label is added that's the bottle ready to be boxed rape seed has half the saturated fats of olive oil and 10 times as much omega-3 plus the high smoke point makes it suitable for frying and roasting as well as the plain oil this farm produces a variety of infusions uh race cath i've got some flavors that uh i'd like you to try this looks good we've got some lovely porcini oil it's good for enhancing your risotto pastas and cooking chicken wow you can really taste the puccini in it straight away that's delicious next up it's the basil chili infusion takes a little while to get going but i'll tell you i can feel it now that can be used on any food that you want a little little boat yeah that works nicely and lastly it's the basil flavoured oil good all-rounder that'd be good for salad that's good very much nice rocket mozzarella salad goes really well that would do a good sandwich these are really nice i think the flavors are awesome i'll tell you what if i all taste like this i'm converted good recent caffeine maybe converts to english rapeseed oil but let's see if we can find the missing ingredient in their move their dream home here in the buckinghamshire countryside a church spire overlooking a canola field we're taking our search to the village of granborough in 1833 this largely agricultural settlement was considered such a tough place to live that the vicar of saint john the baptists appealed to the local square to create alternatives for the poor to spending their winter evenings in the pub despite his protestations the crown is still going strong but other activities do regularly take place in the attractive half-timbered hall built in 1910 the nearest shop is a community run affair about a mile away in neighboring north marston and the house we've come to see is back in granborough located in a close at the heart of the village a very different offering in a great village yeah again it was stables seems to be a theme these were the stables to this house one of the bigger houses in the village okay i'll tell you one thing that is different is how quiet it is here will it tick all the boxes that's the question will it converted from victorian stables in 1992 the front door leads to an l-shaped corridor to the left of which is something that should please kathy the first of three reception rooms i'm just going to stop off in the dining room is this big enough for the table you know i think it might be i think i think this is good yeah it is it is quite windows yeah and floor to ceiling nice natural light coming a great start and the dining room leads straight into a large kitchen breakfast room what about the proportions it's a very nice sized kitchen through there you've got a utility room with a tumble dryer and washer and a downstairs lube okay the layout's good the finishings are really nice i wouldn't walk in here thinking i needed to do a huge amount of work straight away and you've got the nook over here so it's still a fully functional area for breakfast and things like that good it's looking good smiling we're smiling yeah still more good stuff to come let's take a look at this room which is the lovely double doors out into the garden and this huge view yeah and an instant fire oh right okay fires are always good yeah yeah obviously your first prize would be wood wood or anthracite but a fire's a fire it looks looks the it's a nice size reception room in terms of bedroom rooms okay one of them stairs i'd probably keep that as a guest wing because it's got his own little bathroom okay but i'm going to show you one of the ones upstairs upstairs [Music] we also find the third reception room which completes this floor then upstairs there is a family bathroom serving three further double bedrooms the first is located above the ground floor master next to which is another with an inset window and then the largest of the upper floor bedrooms makes bedroom number four this is a nice bright room they're all sort of the same size upstairs in fact they're quite a nice size all the bedrooms so the boys won't have to arm wrestle together they won't have to arm wrestle i'll find something else to own over i like that the fact that there's the one ensuite bedroom downstairs i would have preferred that upstairs but you can't have everything that you wish i like his face potential the nice thing about this property is the scope for expansion because we don't have as yet a suitable office for you right maybe we do lead on kathy and reece are both seeing plenty of potential in this generously laid out home outside there's a third of an acre of garden as well as patio seating to enjoy the extensive countryside views plus a large double garage with power that could just offer them another option now my thought about your study since it's nice to have a work side of the house the present owner was suggesting going up into the roof of this big double garage it's a huge space and the the roof space could quite easily be converted that could potentially be an idea there is absolutely enough space this one is starting to look more like what we're after what do you think of the the outside space the garden's lovely great size the entertaining space is just right i mean we've got some patio things to bring in with us i think this garden's really really lovely what do you think this one's on the market for right so well it's pretty tough considering the previous house we pitched lower on that and i was quite surprised at the price tag i would say six sixty six sixty five no i would go six eight five it isn't under budget but you're a little up to 197 this converted semi-detached stable block offers a generous amount of accommodation a large kitchen breakfast room three reception rooms and four double bedrooms including that ground floor ensuite there's also a detached double garage and it's all in a central village location yes what i like about this is there's plenty of space up here to put uh put an office so i think it's it's nice and high from the cars perspective you've got enough space for two two big cars here and some extra some work space yeah i think this house is really really nice the rooms are lovely and spacious like the size of the bedrooms i like the three reception rooms the size of them is really good the location's pretty good here the garden is just absolutely gorgeous and everything we want from a garden in their house we're looking for nice space for the kids to run around in the dog to enjoy like the fact that it looks over onto farmland which has given us the real sense of being in the country which is what we wanted it's a contender i think the price was a bit of a surprise we are beginning to realize we are going to have to seriously think about making some compromises to find the house that we need to come on out of the garden and have to drag you away from this one and first oh i have to drag this away so that's it for today so you can have some time to sleep on these honda over it and then we've got the mystery house tomorrow speeded up footage of a sun setting on the horizon now yellow and green fields then a village nestled among trees by gently sloping hills we're in the buckinghamshire countryside helping reese and kathy who have recently moved from south africa to find their dream family home we've already shown them two takes on converted stables for their seven hundred thousand pound budget but we've got something completely different lined up for the mystery house which could prove the adage opposites attract it's a very low ceiling i feel quite claustrophobic in here yeah i'm feeling completely the opposite i know i knew you would be lovely plus i'm taking things at a snail's pace at one very unusual buckhim shafarm so snails shoot love arrows at each other yeah i feel like cupid [Music] this is a fascinating house hunt because it's really interesting to see reese and kathy bamboozlement at what's happened in the housing market in the uk in the 20 years they've been away in south africa particularly since they calculated that their 700 000 budget is 14 million rand the mystery house however is well it's a bit of an offering for rhys sort of playing to his desire for an old-fashioned english sort of fantasy country house but in the garden there's a slice of south africa that's going to appeal to the two boys a car driving along a rural track our mystery offering is located in the village of nash five miles away the small market town of stoney stratford includes a high street with a range of traditional shops but it's also the source of a few tall tales this is historically a very important town in the coaching routes up and down the country so it's interestingly the beginning of the cockabull story are you familiar with that yes like the nonsense the nonsense because you have uh two hotels the bull and then there's the and so when the coaches used to go through they used to compete about who had the most outrageous stories from london oh okay that's not a little bit of and bull you've just told no that's true and i many believe the phrase really originates from old fairy tales around and bulls and back in nash the mystery house is something you might also find in a fairy tale here we have it it's the mystery house it's a patch it's batch it's old it's all the things you don't like but it is kind of what you were asking for it is it's i think it's very pretty i mean it really is old english history here um you can see that unlike my wife i don't mind the factory yeah not fun and it's it's essence of countryside yeah actually thatch is an incredibly green ecologically friendly and very effective insulator okay and there are no more spiders than in your normal roof ah okay should we look in yeah let's have a look tight lift i'll smile soon dating back at least five centuries this grade two listed cottage has a recent addition on the near end whilst a victorian edition at the far end was once home to the village shop but it's not hoping we'll sell itself to kathy i've already got a rolling eye oh dear it's a very low ceiling i feel quite claustrophobic in here yeah i'm feeling completely the opposite i know i knew you would be lovely the kitchen itself is lovely i can appreciate that there's lots of things in here that i do like you've got me the gas cooker which was on my list i love cooking with gas we have got lovely granite tops which was something that um we both love yeah well it gets more historic as we go around okay excellent from the kitchen we enter the oldest part of the house and pass through a dining room with fully beamed ceiling and inglenook fireplace so through the dining room into the main sitting room look at the character just like this fireplace look at the stone that's open look at the wooden lintel i mean this is just perfect country cottage stuff keep going rhys keep going it's just gonna break soon she's gonna break this is what we're looking at he's got his rosie turned to the glasses on i can see that there i think this is a fantastic find guys well done i think i could be sold but i need to think about it it's not vast though okay doesn't have a third reception room as it stands okay i think this is a lovely little house so obviously africa has the oldest history of all humanity but they didn't build houses that lasted as long as this no we certainly don't have anything as old as this that i know of let's have a look upstairs let's have a look up steve you can explore later all the looks and crannies this period cottage might not have that third reception room but the newer extension does offer a ground floor utility as well as the first of four bedrooms which is served by a ground floor bathroom stairs at this end of the house lead up to a rather intriguing trap door double bedroom meaning reese and kathy's two boys might enjoy having the run of this wing of the house we're taking the stairs from the dining room to the rest of the accommodation in the other wing where we find the part tiled family bathroom a guest bedroom with featured timbers and then in the center of the home is the largest bedroom number four this is what they're using as the master bedroom another little slice of history up in the beams higher ceiling i was expecting to see thatch on the inside they'd do that in south africa and that's why you have your eight legged friends inside the house no arachnids yes thatch i like the configuration kids that went into the house at the other end of the house that makes a lot of sense nice and airy as well i think you get a lot of light in here but yeah i think um this fits the bill quite nicely for me i know you're loving this this characterful cottage has clearly captured reese but perhaps the outside space will help to win cathy over too set in three quarters of an acre of grounds there's lots of space for a kick about as well as plenty of parking a garden room offers versatility plus an outdoor pool with pool house is a real bonus we couldn't bring you here without giving a little bit of south african luxury swimming pool a swimming pool for that one day and summer when the sunshine it's actually a really nice touch because we have a pool back in johannesburg i know you enjoyed it a lot yeah um and the kids are still young enough to enjoy it so what do you think of the garden is this sort of a good size i think it's the right size it looks like relatively low maintenance um so i'm i'll take the lawn because i like the house well what do you think the price tag on this one is um i think that we're looking at about six seven five six eight five on this i'll give it a ten thousand leeway i would say six eighty six eighty okay in this instance interestingly you're both a bit pessimistic because this is on the market for 650 000 pounds okay that's that sounds like a good number for a house with so much history why don't you guys go have a look inside there's lots of nooks and crannies don't get stuck and i'll see you outside in a few minutes we'll do that thanks we'll shout for help if we get stuck in a tiny house well that went better than i expected because i thought kathy would hate this house and she kind of did at the beginning but rhys is quite persuasive the history is quite persuasive and hopefully she might be persuaded coming in 50 000 pounds below budget this great two listed thatched cottage has a large country kitchen two reception rooms four bedrooms and two bathrooms it also comes with three quarters of an acre garden the pool and out buildings oh elise a nice little sewing room for when you're finished in the kitchen this is very good i think we could definitely do something with this this last house really does tick the major box that i'm looking for and that is a historic old house you know grade two listing 500 years old there are lots of features inside the house that really appeal to me i think i've got a bit of work to do convincing kathy that this is the sort of thing that that would suit her as well as me i think reese is loving this house i think it's exactly what he imagined he was going to find the kitchen's quite unusual but i do love the granite tops i love the cooker it's a nice square kitchen it's got lovely lights and massimo is quite a quirky house so it could grow on me if we compare and contrast a little bit with where we've come from you know we're looking at a budget of seven hundred thousand pounds that would buy us a house probably twice the size on two three times the size of land and you know that's what we've given up um but it's something that we're really happy we've done and if we can end up with a house like this it'll be totally worthwhile there you go oh there you are great tear you away from your newfound love oh yeah yeah yeah yeah we're still not quite convinced you've got some work there yeah i know let's go and find a spot where we can kind of gather our thoughts about all the houses excellent through the branches of a tree a thatched roof buckinghamshire's desirable location close to the capital means that over the years many former farmsteads have become spacious homes for city commuters with little agricultural activity as traditional crops and cattle farming have taken the back seat the most common farm type in the county is the specialist category and i've come to meet sophie wharton who for the last seven years has been producing a decidedly unusual harvest from what is now the biggest commercial outdoor snail farm in the uk i want to know how on earth you got into snails it was an accident i wanted to grow microwave herbs got distracted brought a few snails we had them in the front room in a big plastic box trying to feed them all kinds of things and it was just amusing us they'd been mating and before we knew it the snails had started us a business rather than us starting a business so it was a massive learning curve so how many snails are you producing on this little plot this park will produce three ton it's about 340 000 snails oh my goodness what kind of snows are we talking about they're not garden snails to you they would look very similar to the garden snail however ours are quite a lot bigger hours are faster growing okay because a typical garden snail in uk would take two years to come up to being an adult size whereas our snails will come up to size by september to help her snails grow as quickly as possible sophie feeds them a diet of rapeseed plants supplemented with snail flour a special mix of grains enriched with calcium and vitamins this batch is just nine days old but come the autumn they'll be fully grown and ready to be harvested obviously you breed some snails to eat yes some of these snails will go in chef's snails for the table and some of the snails we hold back then go on to produce for our caviar yes you heard it right snail caviar and those selected to make this diners delicacy are destined for a polytunnel nicknamed the tunnel of love by sophie and she's offered to show me the action come in the tunnel of snail love snails are hermaphrodites and when these are ready to reproduce they develop a hard calcium shard known as a love dart which they fire into a fellow snail this causes hormonal changes making pairing more likely to succeed so snails shoot love arrows at each other yeah like cupid yeah if you look on the back of here you can see a couple of arrows there so someone must have been stood on the edge and missed once mating starts it can last from four hours to two days they decide how long and it's usually dependent on the weather conditions so if it's gonna bucket it down of rain they'll actually speed it up and then again when they produce their eggs it will take them up to two days to lay their eggs so these nails are already mid-flow of laying see what this one's done there's one just coming out now look look at him squeezing it out they're like little pearls each clutch contains anything from 60 to 120 eggs which are then collected to be cleaned and cured at 40 pounds for 30 grams this snail caviar is definitely a luxury item and i'm about to have my very first mouthful snail caviar it's nothing like what you're going to expect it to be like he samples the caviar then contorts his face it's like heavier but not quite as fishy yeah who knew and so then you can serve it in these fancy little um yeah some carnivales that we've made up is black pudding monk fish creme fresh and poppy seed bread crumbs so this is how they serve it in the pot restaurant yes enjoy that's very good so what's really lovely about this because this is so high-end but seeing the way that you're so delighted by the snails still i mean they do their job for me and i have to do a good job to look after them thank you seth it's so wonderful okay glad you enjoyed it [Music] reece will have to have pulled out all the stops to persuade kathy that that period thatched very higgledy piggly property is her dream home but stranger things have happened so let's find out what this couple think about their week in buckinghamshire they're sitting in a garden here we are it's a typical little corner of buckinghamshire the clayton estate so what are your thoughts about buckinghamshire about this move after our week of house hunting we've seen three lovely houses um really nice perhaps not quite fitting what we're looking for oh it's like a knife through my heart to hear that the mystery house clearly struck a chord with me i think we had a view that we would be able to easily get everything we were looking for and that's probably a bit naive and the question is what are we going to compromise on i think i'd possibly give thatch more of a chance now than i would have done before mostly because it's not thatch on the inside as well having the ceiling boards does stop mr eight legs coming down at night um but i still think that these period houses might just still be a little bit too quirky for me so i've still got some work to do to convince kathy that that's exactly what we're going to end up with what happens next what is the next step i think i think it's now a lot of weekend work to go out there and see what's there what else is there well it's a it's a bitter disappointment that we haven't managed to to get you the house of your dreams on the show but it's been really lovely showing it very fascinating actually to see your sort of south african eyes on our housing market i wish you all the best and i'm sure you will find the perfect house if you keep on looking thanks thanks for your time this week it's been great yeah it's really fascinating seeing the uk property market through the eyes of a homecomer particularly someone who's been away for 20 or more years and i guess property prices in buckinghamshire do look pretty shocking when you feel that you've got 14 million rand in your pocket nonetheless i think also that this week has focused kathy and reese's eyes on the prize and they'll find that house with a little more searching and i hope that you join us next time for more escape to the country recent cathy continued their search and eventually found a property in the village of nash the location of our mystery house they put in an offer and it was accepted we wish them all the very best for the future and if you would like to escape to the country in northern ireland scotland wales or england and need our help you can apply online at co dot bbc.co.uk

Channel: Dutch Boy

Views: 15,348

Rating: 4.3290324 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: qDdZlVQb3C0

Length: 42min 59sec (2579 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 24 2020