Glebe House Review: This Devon Agriturismo Is a Must-Visit Foodie Escape

Winding down the bumpy, potholed road to Glebe House, the taxi driver begins building the legend of its head chef and co-founder, Hugo Guest. 

‘Local lad,’ our South African man at the wheel explains, ‘and he’s set up the best restaurant in this area of east Devon.’ He’s not been, he says, but he’s never heard a poor word from the many guests he’s ferried to and from the restaurant. It’s to the point of detriment to his car’s undercarriage – as he points out, ‘the road there is crap’. 

True. Though, bundled as my partner and I are in the car – like Enid Blyton characters, our weekend bags leaping into the air with every bump – we can’t come to regret the trip. We’re in desperate need of a break, thanks to a major housing move, and to have someone else to coo over us for a moment. 

Short of someone actually stroking our hair, there is truly no better stay than at Glebe House for this kind of shoulders-down break. The nine-room guesthouse sprawls over fourteen acres of an undulating pastoral landscape you could lift from a Samuel Palmer painting, and it’s designed like a properly traditional British country home, sunken ha-ha landscaped into the garden and all, but in the 1970s/80s was home to a hippy commune. When Hugo Guest’s parents acquired it, it functioned as a blissful family home for many years. Since 2021, Hugo and partner Olive have operated it as an agriturismo spot. 

One of two Crow’s nest cabins at Glebe House

Some of the charm here is that it maintains that family feeling. In the main house, five bedrooms upstairs were previously occupied by the Guests. Today, these are splashed with art and trinkets, giving them a homely, personal feel. The bright, colourful art that adorns the walls has been curated by Olive – she’s also painted some of it herself – from local artists, and much of the furniture has been sourced pre-loved. Outside, there are three cabins including two new – the Crow’s Nest cabins – where a Granny annexe previously stood. 

The colourful cabins at Crow’s Nest

Checking into the second Crow’s Nest cabin is very simple. It’s simply a short meander off from the main house – past the pool and a field which houses Glebe’s pigs for portions of the year. Right now that field is empty – the pigs have met their fate as breakfast’s sausages by the time sunny season rolls in – but the estate’s pheasants are snuffling through underbrush here and the crows that lend their names to the cabins are chattering overhead. The actual cabins are single bedroom-ed timber behemoths that still smell new. Each connects to the other, should a family want a joint lodging during a stay, but manage to feel independent and sheltered from its twin’s noise. Inside, each has been cheerfully-decorated with throws in sunny shades of orange and yellow, fresh-cut Sweet Williams (vased on the table), and more of Olive’s art. There’s a little cafetiere setup and lovely fresh coffee to match, and still-warm salted chocolate rye cookies on a higgledy-piggled hand-thrown plate, positioned near the wood-burning stove. Outside, there’s a sunken bathtub on its sun-trap deck. 

At Glebe House, the Guests rear pigs

Much of the appeal (hype, in fact) linked to Glebe is a consequence of the Green Michelin Hugo’s kitchen received earlier this year. Though Michelin has recently announced the discontinuation of its environment-award, very few hospitality venues felt more deserving of it than Glebe. The restaurant uses produce, meats and fish from within an arm’s reach – including pork and beef you can pretty much see from the house – in a menu that changes almost daily (to the point where the sample menu on its website will probably be seasonally outdated by the time you check-in). The farm-to-fork ethos has resulted in a truly special dinner experience; at the time of our visit, there’s a wild garlic soup that’s a thick green while fresh day boat fish (lemon sole) makes up our main, served alongside king oyster salsa verde and pressed potatoes, and only cooked to order for us because we’re pescetarian (the rest of the dining room eats an aromatic chicken pot pie). It’s unfussy cooking at its best, i.e. ingredient provenance taking the fore. Hugo being in the kitchen and making regular dashes out is such a boon; he’s generous with his knowledge and happily points to the well-thumbed cookbooks from where he has sourced certain recipes (the cookies, for example, are from Chad Robertson’s Tartine Book No. 3: Ancient Modern Classic Whole although he’s finessed it to his preference over time, with pencil marks across the margins). 

Dinner at Glebe House where the menu is ever-changing with the seasons

The Guests have obviously been driven by some nominative determinism towards their vocation but it really is hard to imagine the chef or the curator founders doing anything but hosting. Both lived in London for various parts of their life – Hugo working across kitchens like Clapham’s Sorella and The Marksman in Hackney. But in this moment Olive is helming the reception desk with an easy smile, talking us through the artists she’s curated on the wall directly behind her, while Hugo fusses between the kitchen and guests. Most guests are staying multiple nights over our visit, and the Guests nurture an easy banter between tables and couples. It’s notable that there are four different dogs; the couples bringing them are testing the water for their first dog-friendly staycation. Another couple are here as they’re scoping out Glebe’s possibility as a wedding venue; they’re enamoured by the romantic possibilities of this landscape and the twisting climbers on the house’s front facade. 

Open April to September, the swimming pool at Glebe is heated with solar energy

Beyond the romance of the interiors, the food, the environment (nearly everything), the house boasts a Douglas fir wood-fired sauna and cold plunge (additional £60 per couple). Located just on from its tennis courts – ask at reception for rackets – this sauna is replete with ginger wellness shots, Finnish sauna hats to borrow and a large Hobbit-hole window looking down over the hills. There’s the pool, too, open from April through September and heated by solar power, and then a stacked programme of year-round activities (think mackerel fishing, art classes, and fermentation workshops). And you’re but a short drive from the Jurassic Coast, with its myriad walks. 

Bumping back over the road towards our return train, it is hard not to feel folded into the Guest family thanks to their generous approach to hospitality – and totally relaxed, to boot, as a consequence of this pastoral idyll. Thanks to their little shoppable larder, we have also brought back granola and brown sauce made on site – eking out some of the magic for a tiny bit longer. 

C&TH Key Notes

• Must-do: Book time in the six-seater Douglas Fir sauna – there’s excellent joy to be had when a pheasant stumbles haphazardly by, as you sweat out any stress. 
• Dish to ask for: while you can’t meander beyond the fixed dinner menu thanks to its commitment to hyperseasonality, you can add a generous share of Glebe’s salumi, butchered on-site. 
• Drink to order: the menu’s wine-pairings are well-worth adding; these favour low-intervention wines from unexpected domaines. 
• Place to visit: the Jurassic coast, and you’ll find a map of its best walks in your bedroom. 
• Table to request: if you’re there on a Friday, the kitchen supper seats you in the heart of the action – and is a convivial experience. 

BOOK IT

Double rooms at Glebe House start from £129 per night on a B&B basis. Cabins at Glebe House start from £250 per night on a B&B basis. glebehousedevon.co.uk