Connect With Nature At Quinta Kismet

We bought a disused vineyard in 2015, shortly after the birth of our first daughter. On a business trip in 2009, we had fallen in love with the Portuguese coast, its people and culture. From then on, our goal was to find a way to trade our fast-paced London life of owning a fashion advertising agency for one spent outdoors on the coast. It’s been a “one day we’ll be ….” dream for many years.

We live in a village perched on a cliff. It is in Sintra, the historic centre of Greater Lisbon. Having both grown up on the coast, my husband and I have always been drawn back to the sea. This was the basis of our search, as well as easy access to a city we love. We sold our agency in 2016 and jumped straight into a world of reed cutting, water collection and food growing, as well as a mammoth renovation project. Quinta Kismet was born.

As well as accommodation, we curate a series of workshops and events each month. These focus on creating opportunities to connect with nature, using the landscape and highlighting seasonal resources.
In the spring and summer, we run coastal foraging courses to find, cook and enjoy local wild foods. The children are busy cracking pine nuts, tasting fresh mussels and eating wildflowers. This is enjoyed by all ages. Families come from all over the world.

From ceramics to contemporary art, nutrition to natural dyeing, we’ll invite some brilliant artists and craftspeople to work with us each year. We hold seasonal celebrations for children to enjoy, for example, our Father’s Day event was a day of learning how to make a fire, key knife skills and bannock bread. We host a variety of activities as private events for schools or visitors with itineraries ranging from seed saving, teaching permaculture principles to making natural festive wreaths.

This is all our children know. Our youngest was one when we moved, so speaking Portuguese and living as we develop the land here is normal for them. Before our water was finally connected, I think my eldest bathed in a bucket until she was about four.

This life is not without its challenges, life on the land is hard work and we don’t have the endless hours we dreamed of (yet), but they have gained an innocence that I associate with my own childhood. They can roam, play and engage in projects without feeling that we are always watching and guiding them. They’ll plan a tepee picnic, hide in the burgeoning food forest, make questionable adjustments to their treehouse and chase chickens from the vegetable garden.

Culturally, here in Portugal, mothers, children and the elderly are a highly valued part of society. They are treated with great care, love and respect. The difference is quite striking. Especially when I think about the first few days with a new baby here compared to London. I often wonder what they will gain in terms of confidence and sense of self as they grow up, just by being appreciated and valued by a community on a daily basis.

My two girls go to the local Portuguese school, so our mornings are focused on that. They’ll check for eggs and we’ll make pancakes or have them cooked, or in a hurry, it’ll be cereal. My youngest goes to the historic pre-school here on the cliff overlooking the Atlantic. Once we’re ready, the best part of the day is walking along the path above the sea pool to get her to school at 9 am. If there’s time, I’ll pick up some strawberries and physalis for their afternoon snack packs. I’m also busy negotiating tooth brushing and who gets the last turn on the swing.

When they finish at 3.15 pm and 5 pm, in the summer we’ll stop off at our local farm shop for a few snacks. Our ideal is to try and hit one of the beaches from around 6 pm, after the sun has lost its intense heat, perhaps stopping off at the ‘kiosk’ café. If it’s a work day, they’ll be picking beans and carrots, playing in the tree house or messing around in the mud kitchen while we finish our work.

Evenings run late for the children here, especially in summer, with dinner at 8 pm, we’ll wash off the mud and sand before a mostly vegetarian dinner of rice and beans, with seasonal vegetables, before a Portuguese book and bedtime according to the time of sunset.

My children can still have fussy and difficult moments at dinnertime, but when they’re in the garden, their relationship with plants as food is so intuitive, they have complete autonomy and confidence in what they’re eating. It frees me from the worry of analysing exactly what they’re eating at each meal. I know they’re grazing on fresh produce throughout the day.

They love pulling up carrots, usually long before they’re ready. They peel peas and beans and eat cherry tomatoes and strawberries. We’ve always had a rule that everyone gets the same on their plate, so there are still some eye-rolls at the presence of kale and lettuce, but they know the plant and they know we grew it.

One thing I appreciate is that they see the value of food and have an understanding of waste and scarcity; for example, the chickens only lay so many eggs, sometimes the peas fail and you have to wait patiently for the berries to arrive, and sometimes they just don’t. Food is seasonal, it’s not just this never-ending stream of choice. You work for it, you appreciate it and you don’t waste anything. The chickens get every last bit of mash. Everything else goes to the worms!