{"id":20269,"date":"2025-07-25T14:16:40","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T04:16:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/?p=20269"},"modified":"2025-08-04T14:38:22","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T04:38:22","slug":"paddock-to-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/country-living\/farm-life\/paddock-to-party\/","title":{"rendered":"Paddock to Party"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Nick and Carina Chambers need look no further than their farm for the ingredients for hosting a long table lunch.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like many life-changing decisions, the genesis was swift, but executing it took much longer. Nick Chambers and his wife, Carina, were returning from a wedding with Carina\u2019s aunt and uncle, Debbie and James Johnson, when it was decided that they should buy Glen Antrim, their farm near Newbridge<\/a> in the NSW Central West.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Paddock<\/figure>\n\n\n\n


\u201cWe were in the back of a taxi talking about how Debbie and James wanted to retire,\u201d Carina recalls. \u201cFor Nick, buying Glen Antrim meant realising his dream of having his own farm, so the decision was obvious. Fortunately, they agreed to a long settlement because we\u2019d just moved to Tamworth for Nick\u2019s work as head of grower services for GrainCorp, so it was four years until we could actually take over.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carina, who is an artist and the founder and coowner of Long Lunch Linen \u2014 a business that imports exquisite French table linen \u2014 grew up on a farm at Spring Ridge on the Liverpool Plains. Nick came from
Hobart, where his dad was a lawyer, though his mother came from a farm in Tasmania\u2019s north, so he had lots of fond memories of time spent with cousins on the farm. Nick and Carina met while they were at university in Sydney \u2014 she was studying communications, design and international studies and he was studying animal science. They pursued their careers in the city until shortly after the birth of daughter Airlie, who is now seven, when they moved to Tamworth. Georgia, who is now five,
was born in Tamworth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Paddock<\/figure>\n\n\n\n


In 2022, they finally made the move to Glen Antrim, a 1000-acre (404-hectare) farm, where they breed Black Angus cattle, based on 200 breeding cows, with bloodlines from both Carina\u2019s parents\u2019 and her aunt and uncle\u2019s herds. They sow oats to graze their cattle<\/a> on and cut it to make hay at the end of summer. \u201cWe feed it to our breeders in the winter after calving when they need extra energy to keep warm and nurse their young,\u201d Carina explains.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As well, the Chambers have 600 Correggiola olive trees and two truffle orchards planted to 800 French and English oaks and hazelnuts. \u201cThe truffles and olives were planted by Debbie and James about 25 years ago,\u201d Carina explains. \u201cThey were among the first to plant truffles on the mainland as the initial Australian forests were in Tasmania. It was only in the \u201970s that the French had figured out a way of taking the wild spores to inoculate the trees to grow them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Paddock<\/figure>\n\n\n\n


Learning from James and professional truffle hunters, the Chambers have trained their English Springer Spaniel, Butter, to find the truffles in the ground. \u201cYou take the dog through the grove and it signifies when it can smell the truffle,\u201d Carina explains. \u201cButter is still learning but she wags her tail madly. In France, they use pigs. We initially mark the trees, then go back and dig the truffles out as gently as possible to avoid scratching the exterior.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Diversification both on and off farm is critical for the Chambers\u2019 operations. \u201cBetween droughts, the pandemic, rising interest rates, economic downturns and time away from work to raise our girls, we find that flexibility and diversity are key elements that help us stay afloat,\u201d Carina says. \u201cNick still works full time for GrainCorp and I work four days a week between my painting and Long Lunch Linen. Georgia is still at home on Mondays. We spend most weekends on the farm and in the evenings during summer when the light is good. Or before work in the winter when we need to feed cattle\u2026 I must admit, not my favourite occupation. Fortunately, we have Aldi ski gear for the frosty mornings. Thankfully, we also have the help of a very experienced friend one day a week. We\u2019d be lost without him.\u201d While Nick and Carina rarely take breaks for relaxing, they do relish time spent with family and friends. In the rare breaks between the many demands on their time, they love nothing better than a long table lunch in the olive grove, serving shared platters of their own produce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n


\u201cLong term, we hope to one day have enough time to really enjoy it all,\u201d Carina says. \u201cOur farm isn\u2019t big enough to sustain a family so it will always need to be supplemented by another income stream. Nick and I often dream about the future where he can read a newspaper, enjoy a cuppa (while it\u2019s still hot) and farm, while I can potter about the garden and paint. In reality, it mightn\u2019t be until retirement for that to happen.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nick and Carina Chambers need look no further than their farm for the ingredients for hosting a long table lunch. Like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":20274,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[336,2],"tags":[71,74,227],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20269"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20269"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20269\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20277,"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20269\/revisions\/20277"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.australiancountry.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}