We're incredibly proud that our Glasshouse café has been crowned Café, Coffee or Teashop of the Year at the Cotswold Life Food & Drink Awards. We're lucky to be in the most beautiful part of the world, with plenty of space to grow vegetables and herbs in the Kitchen Garden, orchards full of heritage trees, exceptional local suppliers, the best beef from our home farm and plentiful pheasant, partridge and duck in season. But we know it's the people who make the guest experience in our farm-to-fork café so fabulous.
The category was judged on several criteria, from the use of local suppliers to the quality of menus, charity commitments to sustainability. The judges, along with actress and author Emma Samms, who hosted the awards at Hatherley Manor Hotel & Spa, near Cheltenham, were impressed from the start.
"Customer service was superb," they told a full house of the region's top restaurateurs, Michelin-starred chefs, farmers and food producers. "The judges were made to feel welcome the moment they walked through the door." They described the decor as "calm and relaxing" and our team "polite and attentive". "Their server gave them so much knowledge of the products from their local area and their own kitchen garden throughout the whole ordering process," they added.
With a keen eye on menu development and the planting in the polytunnel, farmers' daughter Katie Holloway oversees the café operation. Part of the Holloways dynasty, she is the daughter of owners Diana and Edward Holloway. A trained chef, she has brought to the Glasshouse her farm-to-fork expertise and passion for seasonal cookery from the kitchen gardens of Ireland's renowned Ballymaloe Cookery School.
Front of House Manager Lorraine, above, has been welcoming guests with her trademark warmth and energy and sharing our farm-to-fork story with them since she joined Holloways 18 months ago. When she's not leading the team in the Glasshouse, she runs youth activities and loves to spend time with her two grown-up sons and daughter-in-law.
David is our Head Chef. Passionate about local, seasonal food, he heads up the kitchen and brings with him almost 20 years of experience in some of Worcestershire’s smartest hotels and gastro pubs. When he's not in the kitchen, you'll find him in the polytunnel, harvesting the raised beds' bounty to make our daily specials.
Mum-of-three Jacquetta, above, is David's right-hand woman. An accomplished cook, with a menagerie of competition horses and dogs at her country home, she is a keen skiier and a dab hand at baking our famous scones and signature tarts.
Having joined the Glasshouse team in pot wash on Saturdays at the age of 14, Izzy, above, is now a trained barista and Front of House Supervisor. In her eight years at Holloways, she has spent time in sales and admin, and is now in the first year of her English degree at the University of Worcester alongside her role in the Glasshouse. She has ambitions to work in publishing when she graduates.
Our newest Front of House recruit, Fern, below, grew up just along the lane from Holloways. Alongside her farrier father, she is a crack shot with a shotgun. She spends her weekends game shooting on the region's top sporting estates.
