Experimental Group to open Cowley Manor venue with Jackson Boxer
Cowley Manor Experimental is a 17th-century manor house set in 55 acres of countryside that will be home to 36 rooms, alongside a garden room, bar and lounge as well as Experimental Cocktail Club Cotswolds and a 50-cover restaurant that will have space for a further 50 covers on its outdoor terrace. It will also house a library, spa and two swimming pools.
Brunswick House and Orasay chef Jackson Boxer has been appointed chef consultant and will oversee the food offering at the entire property including the main restaurant, room service, Experimental Cocktail Club Cotswolds and the spa. The menus will reflect the property’s locality with a nod to the brand’s French heritage.
The restaurant will use produce from the herb and salad garden that is currently being planted as well as from local growers. Dishes on the launch menu will include small plates of Evesham asparagus with courgette and cucumber; oysters and elderflower champagne; Cowley Garden crudités, and larger dishes such as Cornish lobster tagliolini; grilled Chalkstream trout with sorrel butter; roast lamb with baby peas and grilled leeks; and dry-aged côte de boeuf and smoked bone marrow, and roast chicken with vin jaune sauce to share.
Menus at the spa will be unveiled closer to the launch.
The bar menu at Experimental Cocktail Club Cotswolds will include a grilled brioche sandwich of Gloucestershire ham, Double Gloucester cheese and Wiltshire truffles; caviar with Cowley cream and toasted waffles; tarte flambée of local mushrooms, Rollright cheese, preserved truffles and lardo; and Stinking Bishop gougères.
“I love everything the Experimental Group do, and have always hungered for the chance to put together a really fabulous and unique hotel menu, so when they showed me Cowley Manor I was head over heels,” says Boxer.
“The opportunity to synthesise the delicious, modern and inventive cooking of our shared London and Paris homes, with the extraordinary produce and Arcadian beauty of the Cotswolds, is one I am absolutely thrilled to accept.”
As part of Boxer’s involvement, the kitchen garden will be developed with herbs and vegetables planted by the spa and fruit trees grown above the lake, with the kitchen eventually making use of what is grown.
“My partners and I have long admired Jackson’s work as a chef. He has an incredible gift for making simple, local ingredients shine,” adds Xavier Padovani, Experimental Group business partner.
“We knew from our early days dining together as a group around a big table at Brunswick House that we wanted to work alongside him. We can’t wait to see what he will do in the kitchen at Cowley.”
