It was quickly clear this was no ordinary pub visit. After all, most pubs don't have stewards in high-vis directing people to car parks in fields with more cars than you'll find at some festivals. Already excited to visit, this just made me even giddier.
I was late to the Clarkson's Farm series on Amazon Prime Video and certainly didn't expect to enjoy it as much as I did. After binge-watching most of the first four series I knew I had to visit the famous locations featured in person. A large part of series four was devoted to the opening of The Farmer's Dog, the pub Jeremy Clarkson had long wanted to open. Unfortunately, pesky things like planning rules and buildings on the verge of collapse kept getting in his way.
Hopefully, series five, which launched on Tuesday, June 3 on Amazon Prime Video, will show us how things are panning out. Though, if my visit is anything to go by, I can already tell you: business is booming. It's already almost entirely booked up for the rest of June and July.
But, almost exactly a year ago, I managed to get a table for Sunday lunch at The Farmer's Dog, about 10 miles south of Clarkson's farm shop, Diddly Squat, on the side of the A40 as it winds through the Oxfordshire countryside. It's about a 90-minute drive from west London or Wales, around three hours from Liverpool, Manchester or Yorkshire, and a little over an hour from Bristol.
Is Jeremy Clarkson's pub busy?
In the first couple of series of Clarkson's Farm, one thing that really seemed to annoy council officials and some neighbours of his original farm shop was the huge number of people visiting, clogging up the surrounding roads and parking on grass verges. So I was expecting it to be busy. But I wasn't expecting this.
There were hundreds, if not thousands, of cars parked in a huge field across the road from the pub. I've been to festivals with fewer cars in the car park than this! There was a full-blown security and parking operation guiding arrivals into an enormous adjacent field with hundreds, if not thousands, of cars already parked in it.
Visitors streamed like ants in formation between car park and pub and the stunned "bloody hell!" I heard from a fellow visitor pretty much sums up what I was thinking too. There was a large queue for parts of the farm shop but I didn't need to queue at all to buy what I needed in the shop itself and walked straight to the till without waiting.
There were huge numbers of people enjoying the sun and countryside in the pub's beer garden which looked out over the gorgeous Oxfordshire countryside. I'd naively thought that, given I had a lunch reservation it would be a quiet affair. After all, only so many people can fit in a pub, right? Wrong. Well, half wrong. Yes, there are only so many people that can fit in a pub. But thousands more can sit in the huge beer garden, browse the adjoining shop and just generally wander around happy to be here.
There's a huge green space to enjoy looking out over the Cotswolds. There were people everywhere. Dozens of them waited in line to get into the pub, though thankfully you don't need to queue if you have a reservation - I was impressed that there was a staff member dedicated to finding us and ushering us to the front. I assume everyone queuing was there for a pint of the local Hawkstone beer (in which Clarkson owns a major stake) or a quick photo opp.
The shop at The Farmer's Dog
We were an hour early for lunch so wandered around the back of the pub to explore the large shop, outdoor bar and huge beer garden. There were thousands of people here, sitting in glorious sunshine on wooden benches or on the grass, enjoying a pint of Hawkstone and the gorgeous views out over the Cotswolds farmland that the man himself is so taken with.
The shop sells Hawkstone lager, stout, IPA and cider in crates and gift packs, as well as jams, marmalades, honey, candles, branded clothes and there's a butcher too. I came away with a crate of lager (£28 for 12 bottles) and a £12 jar of honey made from the bees on Diddly Squat Farm.
Sunday lunch in The Farmer's Dog - is it worth the money?
A few minutes before our 1pm lunch reservation, we headed back to the pub entrance and were quickly directed to head inside and shown to our table, tucked away in a little corner right by the glass doors that opened out on to the large outside terrace. So not only did we have a view of the whole bustling inside, we got the breeze and the sunlight of the outdoors too. It couldn't have been better.
The pub is very keen to show off its credentials as a supporter of local farms. A blackboard on the wall named local farmers Vanessa Hartley and Nick Sinden, as well as Rectory Farm, as sources of the food being served. Clarkson had, in fact, originally hoped to open a restaurant on Diddly Squat Farm where he could sell meat and veg from his and surrounding farms. But the council and his neighbours were having none of it, so Clarkson gave up on that ambition and "thought instead of building a restaurant we would buy a pub".
We ordered a pint of the Hawkstone Black stout (£7) and a half of Hawkstone lager (£3.50). Both were excellent (the stout is a match for Guinness) and we sipped them as we sat and waited for our food by watching staff move purposefully through the busy pub, carrying plates loaded up with generous and delicious-looking Sunday roasts and stepping over the odd dog lying at their owners' feet.
There was a pianist playing a grand piano by the front door, a permanent queue at the bar for a pint and a feelgood buzz running through the whole place - everyone just seemed thrilled to be there.
My starter of cold-smoked Bibury trout (£11.50) was fantastic - generous, thickly-sliced trout packed with flavour and possibly better than any smoked salmon I've ever had. I'd been to the Bibury trout farm a short drive away two days earlier, which made it all taste even better somehow, as did the accompanying horseradish cream and watercress salad.
I went for the two-meat main course with beef and pork (£26), which were the only two meat options. It came with roasted whole potatoes, roasted carrots and parsnips, spring greens, red cabbage, cauliflower cheese, Yorkshire pudding and gravy made from the stout. It's hard to distinguish one well-made Sunday roast from another so I won't try too hard. This one was generous, tasty and largely faultless (I could probably have done with a drop more of the delicious gravy).
You could stick with one meat for £2 less and there was a vegetarian option of Wye Valley asparagus with pea pearl barley and a poached egg. Vegans didn't seem to be catered for, which may or may not be on purpose. We were too full for pudding but we did see an Eton mess (£10.50) and poached rhubarb crumble cake with Cotswolds ice cream (£10.50) being carried past. Both looked great.
We were pretty much done with our food within the hour and the bill for two main courses, one starter and two drinks came to £80 (including service). Before leaving, I just wanted to soak in a bit more of the venue so took a look upstairs (also full, of course) and spotted the full-size tractor hanging from the ceiling above the pianist, which I'd somehow managed to miss on the way in.
Should you go? Final thoughts on The Farmer's Dog
Jeremy Clarkson and Amazon Prime Video have created a phenomenon. But don't let that put you off. In fact, it's all the more reason to go, especially when it's close enough for a day trip. The queue for the car park was no more than a few minutes at most and that was the only waiting I did. Thanks to my reservation, I was straight in through the front door and didn't need to queue at the shop either.
My over-riding impression of the huge crowd was how happy we all were to be there. If you wanted a beer (inside or outside) or something from the butcher, you should probably expect a queue, but that's pretty much it.
I felt a bit guilty about being a member of the hordes of people taking over what was presumably a quiet and anonymous part of Oxfordshire 12 months ago - but from what I've read most people in the area are happy to have the pub.
I'm so glad I went and will remember it for a long time. Everyone wanted to talk to me about it when I got home. Pubs aren't only about food, they're about how they make you feel. And I loved every second of this trip.
Season Five of Clarkson's Farm started on Tuesday, June 3 on Amazon Prime Video. The new series features eight episodes, split into three parts spread across a number of weeks. Episodes one to four will be available from June 3, episodes five and six will drop on June 10 and the last two episodes will air as part of a bumper finale on June 17.
