The River Cottage Team

Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall

To read Hugh's biography, click here .

Gillon Meller, Head Chef, River Cottage HQ

Before joining Hugh to set up River Cottage HQ, Gillon had set up his own catering business with the help of the Princes Trust, providing clients with access to great local and seasonal cookery.

After meeting Hugh, Gill started working on the River Cottage series and simultaneously became involved in the running of the cookery school and the River Cottage HQ. Gill is now Head Chef and leads a team who produce the highest standard of local and seasonal food.

Mark Diacono runs Otter Farm, the UK’s only climate change farm, home to orchards of olives, peaches, almonds, szechuan pepper, apricots and a vineyard. He hopes to revolutionise the British larder by growing delicious food normally sourced from overseas. His idea is beautifully sustainable - taking advantage of climate change to grow low carbon food helps arrest its acceleration. It also means he’s lucky enough to spend most of his time eating, growing, writing and talking about food. Mark is currently writing A Taste of Otter Farm.

As well as planting and maintaining the farm's orchards, vineyards, forest garden and veg patch, Mark leads the Garden Team at River Cottage. He runs the growing courses at River Cottage, gives talks and hosts events at RCHQ, and appears in the River Cottage series.

When it's rainy he writes. As well as this blog and occasional pieces for newspapers and magazines, Mark writes every month for The English Garden, and recently had his first book, Veg Patch: River Cottage Handbook No4 published by Bloomsbury.

Pam Corbin - Preserves Handbook author and Preserving expert

Pam Corbin has been making preserves for as long as she can remember. Having always created delicious jams and jellies for her family, she decided, over 20 years ago, to turn her passion into a business. Pam and her husband Hugh moved to Devon where they bought an old pig farm and converted it into a small jam factory.

Here they spent their days making wonderful jams, jellies, curds and marmalades under the Thursday Cottage label. Always using good, wholesome, seasonal ingredients, their products soon became firm favourites with jam-lovers the world over.

Pam has now hung up her professional wooden spoon but continues to ‘jam’ at home. She also works closely with the River Cottage team, making seasonal goodies using fruit, vegetables, herbs and flowers from her own garden, from Park Farm, and from the fields and hedgerows. Pam's book, Preserves , the second River Cottage Handbook is available here.

Ray Smith, Butchery Expert

An extremely knowledgeable butcher, Ray Smith has over 40 years of experience, starting with his own butchers shop in Dorchester over 30 years ago. Ray makes butchery look so easy, because of the skill, finesse and ease with which he brings to the art. Ray leads our many butchery courses and is a regular contributor on ‘Hugh and Friends’. Ray also worked with Hugh on the River Cottage Meat Book and produced the very popular Pig in a Day DVD.

 John Wright, Fungi and Wild Food Expert

John Wright’s passion for mushrooms and toadstools began aged 14, when he came across what turned out to be a Common Inkcap whilst on holiday in the New Forest. In 1980 John joined the British Mycological Society and in 1994, decided to share his accumulated knowledge of Fungi, teaching adult education classes in Dorchester. John now runs fungus forays for several organisations in and around Dorset.

John first appeared on the River Cottage TV series in 2001, taking Hugh on a (successful!) truffle hunt. Several TV episodes later, John is now a regular contributor at River Cottage HQ, running courses on mushroom foraging and edible seashore plants. John's has also written two of the five River Cottage Handbooks  Mushrooms: River Cottage Handbook No.1 and  Edible Seashore: River Cottage Handbook No.5. Also check out Mushroom Magic DVD and the online course which accompanies the mushroom book. 

In addition to his foraging exploits, John runs his own business as a cabinet maker. He is married with two young daughters.