Saving the bacon

WITHIN hours of posting Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s course on the Ballymaloe Cookery School website last year, bookings flooded in. The course was enticingly called ‘Cutting up a Pig in a Day’.

It was quickly booked out with a lengthy waiting list, such is the appeal of this irrepressible chap who gave up his frenetic city life to live in a small holding in Dorset, England.

With masses of energy and the enthusiasm of one who has no concept of the obstacles that lie ahead, he set out on his new adventure at River Cottage with a TV crew in tow week by week the viewers could share his triumphs and frustrations as he embarked on the steep learning curve of attempting to be self-sufficient.