Chef Daniel Clifford buys Essex pub the Flitch of Bacon

Daniel Clifford, chef-proprietor of the two-Michelin-starred Cambridge restaurant Midsummer House, has bought a pub in the Essex village of Little Dunmow.

Clifford has bought the freehold of the Flitch of Bacon, for £300,000, and plans on reopening it in four-and-a-half months' time after an extensive refurbishment, estimated at a cost £500,000. The pub will have 35 covers, has a large beer garden and three letting rooms which will open shortly after the pub itself.

The pub, which will retain the name the Flitch of Bacon, will serve traditional pub food including "forgotten classics" such as steak and kidney pudding and homemade sausages, and Black Forest gateau. Clifford plans to use at least 90% of the produce supplied by his farm Ongar in Essex which he purchased at the end of last year.

"Everything will be made on site with produce from the farm. We also have no ties to a brewery so I will be sourcing great local ales and a local winery which is 15 miles away and will be using them aswell," said Clifford.

"It is a lovely little local pub, 15 minutes from my home that needs a little love. It's in a quaint little village with beautiful thatched houses. I have been driving past it for the past six years, I have always fancied it and when the opportunity came up to buy the freehold it was a no brainer really."