What’s cooking: carlin peas

This heritage crop is making a comeback, and it has more than just good taste in its favour – being a legume, it plays an essential role in regenerative farming. Meet the people who are helping to bring carlin peas back to Britain’s farms and dinner plates

A few weeks ago I spent a day with these two – farmer James Bucher and Bold Bean Co founder Amelia Christie-Miller, at James’s family farm, Hall Farm in Knettishall, on the Suffolk/Norfolk border.

James grows the carlin peas that, once dried and processed, end up in those packets on the shelves at Holland & Barrett, or in the jars that you can buy at Waitrose and direct from Bold Bean Co. I was there to find out more about this heritage crop.

Joining us was Josiah Meldrum, one of the founders of Hodmedod’s, a grass-roots company that is doing its best to change the way we Brits grow, eat – and think about ­– the food we eat (a tall order…) by tapping into the power of pulses and legumes.

As well as supplying James with the carlin peas that are growing in such rude health and vigour at Hall Farm, Josiah is something of a rock star of the UK’s regenerative agriculture scene, a regular speaker at Groundswell, and generous with his time and copious wisdom.

Far from being newfangled, carlin peas have a long history in Britain. Josiah explains: “They would have been a part of the diets of the early farmers that settled in what is now Britain and would have been very important – particularly as a winter food – until the Industrial Revolution, when farming changed and we became more affluent.” With affluence came the stigmatisation of ‘poor’ foods, carlin peas among them.

Legumes such as carlin peas are more than ‘just’ beans. They taste nice, of course, but their real superpower is as nitrogen-fixers, bringing fertility to soils without the need for synthetic fertilisers. Grow and eat more of them, and we can improve our food system.

“Food is a way to intervene in the world around us. If we can change what we eat, we can change everything” – Josiah Meldrum

“I’m an ecologist,” Josiah explains. “The realisation for me was that food is the way that we can intervene in the world around us and that if we can change that, we can change everything – and pulses are just incredible. They fix nitrogen in the soil, they build organic matter, they keep us healthy – there’s no downside.”

Josiah and James have a history that precedes Hall Farm – they went to the same elementary school but only became reacquainted decades later through the burgeoning ‘regen ag’ movement. James is now a near-evangelical convert to the cause. “For me it’s about rebuilding life in the soils,” he says. “We’d always done conventional farming here, but we got to a stage when we we’d seen massive soil degradation through heavy tillage, too much use of chemicals and fertiliser. When we got a lot of rain, we were seeing soil disappearing off the fields or pooling on the fields and not able to get through [to the roots] because the soil was very compacted. So in 2018 we started to change how we were farming. We wanted to have a system that we can farm working with nature.”

In 2021 James decided to go cold turkey and convert to ‘regen ag’. He has since cut his use of synthetic nitrogen fertiliser by a staggering 75%, cut way back on a host of agrochemicals and reduced water use, while increasing biodiversity and making the farm a more welcoming place for walkers and visiting school groups. “It’s empowering,” he says, and it shows.

Here at Hall Farm, the carlin peas are grown with a companion crop, called triticale, a hybrid of wheat and rye. The triticale literally supports the climbing peas as they grow, and the peas fix nitrogen into the soil – a win-win for the cereal and the legume. And, of course, the human who gets to eat these beans.

That’s where Amanda comes in… You may have seen her on ‘Dragon’s Den’, where she went through the nail-biting, nerve-wracking experience of pitching for investment in Bold Bean Co. The one-time private chef is on a mission to make us all as bean-obsessed as she is – and she has the passion and nous to do it. Her range of premium jarred beans have won praise from Nigella Lawson, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Anna Jones among others, and her cookbook, Bold Beans: recipes to get your hear racing (Kyle Books), has helped ignite the UK’s ‘bean renaissance’ (the recipes are excellent).

Need more good reasons to eat carlin peas? There’s health for one. They’re high in fibre, high in protein and low in fat. Then there’s taste. If you like chickpeas (and who doesn’t?), then you'll love carlin peas; think of a chickpea crossed with a chestnut and wrapped up in a brown coat that absorbs flavours and dressings.

The food we choose makes a difference that reaches way beyond our dinner plates. For better or for worse, the ripple effect reaches into the rural environment and deep into the soil.

Too much of Britain’s food heritage has been lost through changes in fashion, economic shifts or just sheer indifference, so it’s heartening to see a crop like carlin peas being brought so deliciously back from relative obscurity.