Hundred House Year…

We're not going to say the obvious!

  • We’ve made a conscious decision not to state the obvious! We all know how tough it’s been, we’ve all felt it the pain of feeling utterly powerless against this awful thing this year.
  • We will carry on, doing everything we can to make sure we’re here to serve you for many years to come!
  • We remain strong and positive, so here’s a look back at the nicer things about our year!
  • From the bottom of our hearts, thank you for your support and we wish you ALL a Happy New Year!
  • Love from Team Hundred House. xx

January to March

  • January – Having won “Best Wedding Venue in the West Midlands” for the 3rd year running in The Wedding Industry Awards, 11 of the team traveled down to London for the finals. We hired a swanky house by the “Liz’s Palace” and hit the town for a meal & drinks before the award! Once in “Café de Paris”, the team where all having kittens as our category was the last one read out! We didn’t win the big prize, however we got “Highly Commended”, which basically means 2nd best in the whole country, so not too shabby, we’ll take that!!
  • February – Finalist in “Whats On Live” Awards for “Best Independent Restaurant in Shropshire”. Sadly the result where never disclosed, being due around end of March, needless to say we weren’t thinking about chasing it up at that time!
  • March – Another greenhouse goes in and we plant 1000’s of seeds! Everything from herbs, carrots, beetroot, pumpkins, squash and many varieties of flowers.
  • Lock down is announced, everything stops and our doors closed just before our busiest day of the year and we have the heartbreaking task of postponing many Weddings.

April to June

  • April  – Usually hundreds of people would be admiring Henry’s amazing garden throughout Springtime, it was a sad sight to see the garden so beautiful but so empty. Much love and time was given to planting over 2000 tulips & daffodil bulbs the previous Autumn, yet ever after a positive, Henry agreed to let us cut and sell them off for the NHS. We had no way of selling them ourselves, so we enrolled our friends at Apley Farm Shop, who where still open. We raised around £400 and bought a little bit of floral cheers in to a good few homes too!
  • We team up with Foodshare Project, a team of fabulous people who are dedicated to stopping food going to landfill (you wouldn’t BELIEVE how much does!). All of our Chefs got involved and volunteered there time. Imagine a ready, steady, cook type scenario – we get given whatever they where given on the day before, then make something tasty! Over the course of this first lock down period the Chef’s made over 3000 meals, which where distributed to families on low income or vulnerable and those shielding or isolated. This is something we were incredibly proud of and continue to work with Foodshare to this day.
  • May – We reinvent & renew the Hotel interior, whilst staying sympathetic to it’s roots and Sylivia’s vision of The Hundred House. There are new table tops, the chairs get a makeover, artwork rethought and little touches make the dining rooms seem lighter & brighter.
  • June – Street food Saturday was born! From a simple Facebook post of our lunch at home, we got the most likes ever! This was totally new to us, having always been English food with European influences but we had the totally confidence in our kitchen team to develop new Menu’s!
  • Our Outdoor Kitchen was installed, complete with authentic Kadai Firebowl and Pizza Oven made by uber talented Ron, mounted on Syvia’s old Donkey cart (how “us” is that?!!).
  • The Chef’s got back in the kitchen to develop to FULL Menu, with the hope’s of re-opening in July. We wanted people to be able to come and visit us no matter if they wanted a full A la Carte meal or to chill in the garden with a few beers and order Tapas & Taco’s and at anytime between 12-8 pm. All new for us!
  • Our new Marquee was purchased & erected, enabling the Restaurant to function with similar covers to before half the tables where removed for social distancing. We wanted to make sure it was still a beautiful environment to dine in, so chandeliers & fairy lights added charm and local Nursery, Moongate by Apley Farm Shop were kind enough to loan us some of their beautiful urns and even the trees they had in the Barn when they married here in 2019!

July - September

  • July – Oh my Gosh, were the team chomping at the bit to get back! We reopened on Saturday 4th July, with our first Streetfood Saturday to fabulous feedback about the food and our new Marquee.
  • 9th July was our first Wedding after lockdown. We had tried desperately hard to bring forward Courteney & Aaron’s Wedding in March, but despite doing this the country was locked down one day too early! It was magical to see them married and know that by doing this they could be together,as a “forces” couple.
  • August – Eat out to Help out, scheme hit… maaaaan, were we busy bees! It was incredible boost to see the confidence returning to people to venture out. Once our guests were here the feedback of how safe they felt was heartwarming. We took vast amount of measures, over and above the guidelines, to keep everyone safe and we were repaid by trust in us.
  • Our Wedding Manager, Gemma, beats back the nerves to go live on BBC West midlands, discussing how Covid has effected our Weddings. We can not praise Gemma highly enough for the work she has done, postponing around 60 Weddings this year and doing so in an unbelievably caring and sympathetic manner, we know she is cherished just as much by the dozens of couples she has helped during this incredibly tough year.
  • September– We won “Best Community Pub” (in the whole Country ). The team work incredibly hard to make The Hundred House a special place to be, we’re definitely felt the love today to be recognised by such a prestigious award, in conjunction with The Telegraph & Sawdays https://www.telegraph.co.uk/…/raise-glass-telegraph…/
  • Our first Hundred House Apple Juice! We have a large variety of apples we grow onsite, this year they got picked and chauffeur driven by Henry to Abbiss Farm, Hereford, for pressing & bottling. Over 2.5 kilo’s go in to every bottle, totally organic and divinely delicious!

October to November

  • October– 2500 spring bulbs are planted, different and interesting varieties of tulips, daffodils and hyacinths!
  • We harvest hundreds of pumpkins, squashes & gourds planted at The Hundred House & Stuart & Jo’s garden, some will be made in to delicate dishes, some will decorate the Hotel!
  • November– Back in to Lockdown we go and our kitchen team where keen to volunteer to help out making food for Foodshare Project again. We did a “Supermarket Sweep” and had a whole van load of food, which we made in to hundreds more meals to be distributed.
  • We were delighted to host a Wedding with 36 hours notice, just before lockdown! We’ve hosted many Wedding’s “quickly” but 36 hours is our record, lol! It was a delight to make Abigail & Rhys’s dreams come true and with the BBC filming too, their story & memories where shared with all of the West Midlands! Abigail left us this review on our Facebook page, which set us all off again and what a high to end on when you have to close again for National lock down!
  • “WHAT CAN WE SAY!? Yesterday I think we made Hundred House History. Pulled our wedding forward before lockdown #2. Gem is the most incredible wedding organiser ever, the venue was just beautiful. The food was absolutely delicious, I think me and the guests we had all agree that it was the most incredible beef we had EVER had! Honestly cannot thank Stuart and the team for making our day happen and it was even more magical than I ever expected even before lockdown happened!
  • They will forever hold a special place in our hearts. We look forward to our annual meal and stay on our anniversary each year.
  • So much love,
  • Mr & Mrs Knight”

    • December

    • December- We launch our Christmas Hampers for the first time! Developed during November lockdown, not really sure how they would be received? After the first initial Facebook post we were humbled by how well received the idea was and orders coming in from people who wanted to support us.
    • Tier changes mean many people’s plans change at the last minute. so “Christmas Day Takeaway” was born & launched with just 6 days before Christmas Day (we like to challenge ourselves)!
    • Christmas Day Lunch was sold out and there was a fabulous atmosphere between guests and the team alike!
    • New Years Eve was full and all food was prepared when the announcement came on the 30th, the whole team was obviously extremely saddened by this news, however we WILL remain positive and strong!
    • We will reopen as soon as we get the green light from the Government and as always, during these lock downs, a small core team will be on hand to answer enquiries every few days.
    • WE WOULD LIKE TO THANK ALL OF OUR CUSTOMERS, FROM THE BOTTOM OF OUR HEARTS, WHO HAVE SUPPORTED US THROUGH THIS INCREDIBLY STRANGE & DIFFICULT YEAR!
    • HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE OF YOU, WE ALL NOW HAVE HOPE THAT 2021 WILL BE A MUCH BETTER YEAR AND WE CAN’T WAIT TO FLING THE DOORS OPEN AGAIN!
    • Team Hundred House. xx