Latest news with #ComptonAbbas
The Sun
08-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Sun
Huge Hollywood star opens new Texas-style BBQ joint – in the middle of a UK airfield
Plus, the star has his own brewery close-by SMOKE SHOW Huge Hollywood star opens new Texas-style BBQ joint – in the middle of a UK airfield A FAMOUS movie director has opened a Texas barbeque joint... on a vintage airfield. Guy Ritchie's Lore of the Sky restaurant has opened in Compton Abbas Airfield in Dorset. Advertisement 4 A famous movie director has opened a Texas barbeque joint… in England Credit: Instagram 4 Guy Ritchie's Lore of the Sky restaurant has opened in Compton Abbas Airfield in Dorset Credit: Instagram Set at the airfield, with views across Shaftesbury, Lore of the Sky serves up typical Texas barbecue dishes that are smoked on-site. According to the restaurant's Instagram, the spot serves up "smoked flavour, countryside views, and aviation history in full flight". Having opened seven weeks ago, the menu boasts dishes crafted by Chef Alex Brown including oak-smoked pork belly and loaded nachos. And despite being a meat-loving Texas-themed joint, there are also options for veggies with jackfruit burgers made in a smoker available too. Advertisement The restaurant also serves breakfast options including a smokehouse breakfast for £9.95 or smokehouse pancakes for £7.50. As for the airfield itself, visitors can investigate historic aircraft and even do a bit of plane spotting. The airfield also hosts a number of events throughout the year including 'Warbird Weekends' taking place from July 24-27 and July 31 to August 3. Over the weekends, visitors can see iconic aircraft including a Spitfire. Advertisement One visitor commented: "I would recommend this place to anyone." Yet reviews for the destination have been mixed. Pub With A 'Floating' Beer Garden By The Beach According to The Telegraph's restaurant critic, William Sitwell, his experience of Guy's restaurant was that it was his "foulest lunch of the year". He added: "They call this dirty food. I'd say it was just filthy." Advertisement The entire airfield is owned by Guy Ritchie, who bought it back in 2023 and it has also been used for films including Lawrence: After Arabia. In an interview with Flyer, Guy shared that in the future he hopes to have an experience at the site where visitors can walk through the hangars. Guy Ritchie also has a restaurant in London called Lore of the Land. 4 Set at the airfield, with views across Shaftesbury, Lore of the Sky serves up typical Texas barbecue dishes that are smoked onsite Credit: Instagram Advertisement Unlike Lore of the Sky, this spot in Fitzrovia is a traditional British pub that serves food and drink over three floors, including Sunday roasts. The film director also previously co-owned The Walmer Castle in Notting Hill with David Beckham. Then, close to Compton Abbas Airfield, is Gritchie Brewing Company – the film director's 'beer farm'. For £15 per person visitors can go on a tour of the brewery - which lasts between an hour and an hour-and-a-half. Advertisement A 'professional pub drinker' has also shared the London boozers where you might see stars like the Beckhams and Ed Sheeran. Plus, the UK pub secretly visited by Ariana Grande that's 'never been busier'. 4 As for the airfield itself, visitors can investigate historic aircraft and even do a bit of plane spotting Credit: Instagram
Telegraph
05-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
‘Guy Ritchie's is the foulest lunch of the year': Lore of the Sky, Compton Abbas, restaurant review
The dramatic landscape of Dorset was at its best. Blue sky and fabulously green rolling hills – I could admire it from the airfield at Compton Abbas. It was from here, in 1993, that Asil Nadir fled in a six-seater to northern Cyprus, accused of stealing from his firm Polly Peck. This particularly irked the landed locals who had piled into the multifarious FTSE hero before it went belly up. Nadir was later sentenced to 10 years, but the squires or their descendants still fume at the diminished plans for their pool houses. You don't need a private jet to visit Compton Abbas. Today, like many such small airfields, there's an eatery to pull you in. And this one is owned by Guy Ritchie, the film director who crafts extraordinarily witty movies and who has dabbled successfully in hospitality, too – he has a restaurant in London's Fitzrovia, called Lore of the Land. Lore of the Sky promised a smokehouse serving the finest fare of Texas, but in fact provided me with the foulest lunch of the year. It's a handsome modern building of slatted wood and glass, echoed by the roomy interior: aircraft-hangar cool. There's a desk in the middle from which came news that there was no trace of my booking. At least not on their side; yet the emails of confirmation, and those urging me to leave feedback (at your service, right here, right now), had flowed thick and fast. There was plenty of room, however, and we were duly taken to a dirty table by the window. Note to Lore of the Sky: better to keep punters waiting while you clean and re-lay a table than show them to one spread with the effluence of the last gobblers. The menu, making use of a vast smokery, is full of that pulled style of meat: slowly cooked and then literally forked off the bone. I fancied the pulled pork in a bun and couldn't resist the idea of 'pork belly burnt ends', either. We also ordered oak-smoked chicken leg, Caesar salad and fries, with 'smokehouse nachos' to share as a starter. Back came our charming waitress with news that they'd run out of pulled pork and its burnt ends. Yes, a Texas-style smokehouse runs out of pig. It's like Big Ben losing its bells or Margaret Thatcher without a handbag. So I went for the pulled beef instead (the other choice was 'pulled jackfruit', and if you've pulled a jackfruit something's gone seriously wrong). The nachos came: a splattered mess of stuff that had landed on tortilla chips. There was yellow gloopy goo pretending to be melted cheese, and on that bits of meat, somehow rendered green. I'd hesitate to call it chicken as that would shame the name of protein, but imagine a few weeks of life in a dingy shed with an afterlife this insulting? Sweet red sauce flowed around it. There was a squelch of avocado on the side and I picked at it briefly like a pigeon searches for nutrients in a cowpat. My pal Flozza just looked at it and said, 'Oh my god, that's revolting', refusing to brave a bite. A dish of chicken was like Epsom in winter – firm, too hard for this pony – and was drizzled in a spicy red sauce which failed to either overpower or rescue it. My pulled beef was dismal and the chips, like everything else I'd wager, the work of talent some distance from Compton Abbas. Likewise the bought-in Caesar salad sauce and croutons, and frozen-solid Yarde Farm ice cream. They call this dirty food. I'd say it was just filthy.
Telegraph
04-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Britain's historic airfields make for a thrilling day out
This year marks the 85th anniversary of the Battle of Britain, when – for three and a half months, between July 10 and October 31 1940 – the skies above the UK whirred with the throaty roar of Supermarine Spitfires and Hawker Hurricanes, defending the country from the German Luftwaffe. There could, then, hardly be a better moment for Britain's airfields to be thriving as they currently are, with many rebranding themselves as the country's new premier heritage family day out. Leading the charge with his revamp of Compton Abbas airfield in Dorset is director Guy Ritchie – but he's not the only one: from West Sussex to Bedfordshire, these bastions of aviation 's Golden Age offer the chance to see (and even fly – or jump out of) planes – both vintage and modern – soak up a bit of history, and enjoy a slap-up meal. Tempted? Here are the best of the bunch, and everything you need to know to plan your visit. Compton Abbas Airfield, Dorset Close to the pretty town of Shaftesbury, Guy Ritchie 's airfield offers visitors the opportunity to observe double-formation take-offs and spectacular airborne loops, then sit down to a lunch of smoked pork belly or beef brisket at the Lore of the Sky, sister restaurant to his London pub, the Lore of the Land. According to Jason Hammond, the ex-military veteran at the helm of Compton Abbas Airfield, Ritchie has a 'definite bent for nostalgia', and 'tends to have a low-key pint at the converted horse box bar or an ice cream at the Smoking Barrels snack bar' when he visits. If spectating offers insufficient excitement, opt for Aero Legends' 40-minute 'Needles' experience (from £4,250 per person), during which you'll go up in a Spitfire and soar over the Isle of Wight. Alternatively, you can fly in a Tiger Moth for 15 minutes (from £179 per person), or in a bright yellow American T-6 Texan (from £519). If you're based in the South East, note that Aero Legends also offer flying experiences from the North Weald airfield in Epping, one of the Battle of Britain's key fighter bases, and from the Headcorn Aerodrome in Kent. Where to stay: The King John Inn in nearby Tollard Royal is a dog-friendly Victorian country inn with eight en-suite rooms, costing from £110 per night. Sandown Airport, Isle of Wight Billed as the UK's 'premier destination airfield', Sandown Airport offers helicopter flights with Flydays (from £99 for an 18-mile scenic route) and even skydives over the island's spectacular rolling countryside, as well as wood-fired pizzas and barbecues at its popular Island Bistro. The site is also home to the Wight Aviation Museum, located in a disused hangar (open Friday-Tuesday until the end of October), where you'll find a full scale replica of the Black Arrow rocket, a British satellite carrier developed during the 1960s, among other exhibits. The airport, which served as a training airfield during the Second World War, makes a wonderful local day out for those holidaying on the eastern side of the island, where you're also within easy reach of Brading Roman Villa, Dinosaur Isle and several dog-friendly beaches. Details: Where to stay: Haven Hall is a five-star country house hotel in nearby Shanklin with views over Sandown bay and rooms from £352 per night. Goodwood Aerodrome, West Sussex Known as RAF Westhampnett during the Second World War, today the aerodrome draws pilots and passengers alike with its promise of bird's-eye views over the Solent and Isle of Wight. While the flying experiences offered here by The Spitfire Academy are eye-wateringly expensive (from £3,250 for 30 minutes in the air), those in the modern Cessna, one of the most popular training aircraft in the world, are a good deal more reasonable, at £185 for 30 minutes, or £525 with an aerobatic pilot in a two-seater stunt aircraft. If a helicopter ride is more your speed, opt instead for a 17-mile tour of the 11,000-acre Goodwood Estate (from £75 per person) before heading for the estate's excellent farm-to-fork restaurant, Farmer, Butcher, Chef, for a hearty meal of beef, pork or lamb reared at the Goodwood Home Farm. Where to stay: The Goodwood Hotel, a smart, comfortable four-star on the edge of the South Downs National Park, has rooms from £225 per night. Old Warden Aerodrome, Bedfordshire This privately owned airfield is home to a stunning Regency-era garden, a woodland sculpture trail, 875 acres of lakeside parklands – and the superlative Shuttleworth Collection, a treasure trove of vintage aircraft, cars, motorcycles and agricultural vehicles. There are seven action-packed air shows each season, including the Summer Air Show on July 26; Flying Proms (expect fireworks and aerobatic pyrotechnics) on August 16; and a Best of British Air Show on August 30. Make time, too, for a stop at the delightful Runway Café, which serves seasonal dishes. Details: Where to stay: The Keeper's Cottage, a model cottage tucked away in the woods of the estate, is available through the Landmark Trust from £412 per night. Imperial War Museum Duxford, Cambridgeshire No selection of Britain's homages to vintage aircraft would be complete without mention of Duxford, home of the country's largest aviation museum. The aerodrome, built during the First World War, was one of the earliest Royal Air Force stations and now houses galleries depicting the personal stories of lives impacted by conflict, a permanent Battle of Britain exhibition and an American Air Museum with a giant B-52 Stratofortress (an American long-range subsonic jet-powered strategic bomber) and commemorations for those who served in Afghanistan. A packed calendar of events includes a Battle of Britain Air Show (September 6-7) and the well-loved Duxford Dash – a 'family mile', 5k or 10k run – on October 26. Details: Where to stay: Cambridge Lodge is a two-bedroom holiday cottage at nearby Audley End House and Gardens, an English Heritage property, from £515 per night (sleeps four). Dunkeswell Aerodrome, Devon The village of Dunkeswell – set deep in the Blackdown Hills National Landscape, close to the Somerset border – is home to the highest licensed aerodrome in the UK. Built in 1943, it was occupied by the USAAF 479th Anti Submarine Squadron and, later, the US Navy. In fact, post-March 1944, Dunkeswell was the only US Navy base in all of Europe. Today, the terrace of the Aviator Coffee Bar and Restaurant is a wonderful spot from which to take in uninterrupted views of various aviation activities. If you prefer to get in on the action, a 30-minute Spitfire flight over Exeter and Torbay will set you back £3,400; while skydiving and wing-walking (not for the faint-hearted) are also on offer, as are thrilling microlight and helicopter flights. There's also a heritage centre, where visitors can browse memorabilia and archive photography.
