How Ancient Shepherds Is Redefining Fine Dining: A conversation with Chef Mark Poynton, Ancient Shepherds
- James Massoud
- Aug 15
- 4 min read
Michelin starred chef Mark Poynton has never been one to follow the rules, and with his latest venture, Ancient Shepherds in Fen Ditton, he’s rewriting them entirely. A stripped-back, tasting menu-only restaurant housed in a 400-year-old former pub, Ancient Shepherds champions a progressive new vision for fine dining: one rooted in staff wellbeing, local philanthropy, sustainability, and unpretentious brilliance. In this exclusive interview with The Knife, Poynton talks ego-free kitchens, rethinking “local,” and what true success looks like in modern hospitality.
Ancient Shepherds marks a bold shift toward sustainability and staff wellbeing, why was now the right time to change the blueprint for how fine dining works?
We were always looking to make best practice for staff; moving away from multi-choice menus, and introducing shorter weeks – it's a balancing act for the business.
With tasting menus only and a tightly run four-day working week, how do you balance the rigour of Michelin-level cooking with the need for rhythm, rest and retention in your team?
It's vital. You have to be at the top of your game for 12 hours a day, and you need enough rest and downtime to be able to perform at the level required, so four days on / three days off with five weeks closure for holiday fits that.
Your new site has a history with you, what does it mean to reopen in Fen Ditton with Ancient Shepherds, and how does this location shape the soul of the restaurant?
The Ancient Shepherds has been a public house since 1805, so it's important to respect that, hence we still serve Hawkstone beer and IPA. We have just kept the evolution to what it now is.
Caistor Hall earned its Michelin star while Ancient Shepherds feels like a deeply personal evolution, how do the two complement each other in your creative and culinary life?
They are both personal, but also very different. They both run tasting menus only, but the food is different as the clients are never the same, and the buildings are each unique. In Caistor Hall, we respect it's in a manor house and we are serving in what was the ball room, so the presentation and service are more reflective of that, whereas Ancient Shepherds is in what is basically a public house, so equally we respect the surroundings of that in style of service etc. But both offer amazingly delicious food cooked with love and respect.
From classic British produce to Japanese influences like wakame and ponzu, your menus speak fluently across cuisines. What excites you most about this cross-pollination of flavour?
It always has and will be about respecting the produce, but using travels and inspiration to elevate them as much as we can.
Locality plays a key role, from your kitchen garden to long-term suppliers. How does your idea of ‘local’ go beyond postcode and into philosophy?
Local is a strange one! Yes we grow strawberries and tomatoes plus many other things, and use local suppliers when the produce is good enough, but we have to remember France is 115miles from Cambridge and Scotland is 300, so locality isn’t what people understand. We buy the best possible produce we can, but sometimes that’s not British and we want the best.
The restaurant partners with local charities and offers ‘invisible dishes’ to support them, how important is it for you that hospitality gives back and not just serves?
We have always been about giving back – in all my restaurants. We are in the privileged position that people with disposable cash want to spend it with us, so if we can pass some of that on to support local charities, we always will because sometimes we have to remember not everyone is dealt the same hand in life.
Congratulations on being voted Norfolk Chef of the Year by your peers, what does that recognition mean to you, especially from within the industry itself?
Always amazing, and something I will never take for granted. Any award is recognition of what the amazing teams behind me do and for that I'll always be thankful.
You’ve been mentoring young chefs for years through “A Passion to Inspire” – what advice do you give today’s up-and-comers that you wish you’d received yourself?
Never take anything personally, write everything down, and taste your bloody food! Not enough chefs teach how and why tasting whole dishes is important.
You've seen the industry evolve dramatically, what still needs to change in the wider hospitality landscape for it to thrive, not just survive?
We need less egos and more leaders – real leaders, people that inspire others to want to be better and try harder.
Finally, what does success now look like to you – is it another star, a full dining room, or simply getting to enjoy your weekends again?
A full restaurant of happy customers who come for what we do is the only way we can measure success.
