On 23 August 2024, hundreds of people queued for hours outside a pub in a small Oxfordshire village. Not for a band, not for a celebrity appearance, but for a pint in a building that had been closed and was now owned by a man best known for shouting at cars. The Farmer’s Dog is Jeremy Clarkson’s pub, and its central idea is far more interesting than its owner’s fame.

The Farmer’s Dog: Quick Facts

Name	The Farmer’s Dog
Owner	Jeremy Clarkson
Location	Asthall, Oxfordshire
Reopened	23 August 2024
Opening day	Hundreds queued for hours
Concept	Everything sourced from British farms
Featured in	Clarkson’s Farm series 4 and 5
Nearest town	Burford, Oxfordshire
Setting	The Cotswolds
Linked business	Diddly Squat Farm Shop
Series 5	Covered ongoing challenges at the pub
Series 6	Confirmed filming in June 2026

What Is The Farmer’s Dog?

The Farmer’s Dog is a pub in Asthall, Oxfordshire, bought and reopened by Jeremy Clarkson on 23 August 2024. The process of buying and restoring it was filmed for series four of Clarkson’s Farm, and series five followed the considerably harder business of actually running it. It sits in the Cotswolds not far from Burford, and it is a short drive from the Diddly Squat farm itself.

The All-British Rule

The concept sounds simple and turns out to be extraordinarily difficult: everything served must come from British farms. No imported olive oil, no foreign wine, no out-of-season vegetables flown across the world. Try planning a menu under that constraint and you quickly discover how much of a normal British pub kitchen depends on imports. That struggle is the whole point, and it is also the show’s sharpest argument about how little we actually buy from our own farmers.

Opening Day Chaos

The reopening on 23 August 2024 drew hundreds of customers who queued for hours. For a village pub, that is not a triumph so much as a crisis. Kitchens have capacity, cellars have capacity, and staff can only serve so fast. Anyone who has worked in hospitality knows that being overwhelmed on day one is far more dangerous than being quiet, because the people who wait and then get poor service do not come back.

Why a Pub At All?

It fits the same logic as the farm shop. A farmer selling wheat or beef into the commodity system takes whatever price the market gives. A farmer serving their own produce to customers at a table captures far more of that value. The pub is the furthest point along that chain. It is also, not incidentally, a way of supporting other British farms by buying from them, which is the part that made the industry pay attention.

British Pubs Are in Trouble

Context matters here. British pubs have been closing steadily for years, hit by energy costs, staff shortages, changing drinking habits and rising rents. Village pubs are the most vulnerable of all, because the local population alone rarely sustains them. Buying a closed one and reopening it is a genuinely risky thing to do, celebrity or not. That the show treats it as difficult rather than charming is one of its better qualities.

Series 5 and the Ongoing Struggle

Series five, released on Prime Video on 3 June 2026, covered the continuing challenges of running the place. Hospitality is relentless in a way farming is not: farms have seasons, pubs have every single evening. Add the all-British sourcing rule and the enormous visitor numbers the show generates, and you have a business under permanent strain. The rest of the Clarkson’s Farm cast appear around it, but the pub is largely its own storyline.

Where Is Asthall?

Asthall is a small Cotswolds village in Oxfordshire, near Burford and not far from the Diddly Squat farm. Like Chadlington, it is a genuinely small place, which means the same tension applies: a national audience arriving in a village built for a few hundred people. If you visit, the same rules apply as at the shop. Park sensibly, be patient, and remember that people live there.

Can You Just Turn Up?

It is a working pub, so in principle yes, but in practice check ahead. Demand fluctuates enormously with the broadcast schedule, and turning up at the wrong moment means a long wait or no table. Booking where possible is sensible, particularly for food. As with the farm shop, the honest advice is to go outside peak times if you actually want to enjoy it rather than simply say you have been.

What It Serves

The menu is built around British farm produce, including meat and vegetables sourced domestically, with drinks following the same principle. Because of the sourcing rule, the offering shifts with what is genuinely available, which is closer to how eating used to work before year-round imports. Some customers find that limiting. Others regard it as the entire appeal. Both reactions are fair, and the pub has never pretended it is trying to please everybody.

The Wider Point About Food

Strip away the celebrity and there is a real argument here. British farmers produce excellent food and then watch supermarkets fill shelves with cheaper imports. A pub that commits to buying only from them is making that argument in the most practical way available. Whether one pub changes anything is debatable. Whether millions of viewers now think about sourcing when they order a meal is considerably less debatable.

How It Connects to the Farm

The pub, the farm shop and the farm itself form a single strategy: grow it, sell it, serve it. Lisa Hogan runs the retail side, Kaleb Cooper handles production, and Charlie Ireland works out whether the numbers survive contact with reality. The pub is the most exposed part of that chain because hospitality fails fastest, which is precisely why it makes such compelling television.

What Happens Next

Clarkson confirmed in June 2026 that series six was already filming, so the pub will continue to appear. Its longer-term future depends on the same things every pub depends on: costs, staffing and whether people keep coming once the novelty fades. The interesting test will be what happens in a quiet January, several years from now, when nobody is queueing. That is when you find out whether a pub is a business or a gimmick.

Why Sourcing British Is So Hard

Consider what disappears from a normal pub menu under an all-British rule. No lemons, no olive oil, no pepper, no coffee, no wine from anywhere warm. Suddenly a chef is building dishes from what actually grows here, in the season it grows. That is how British cooking worked for centuries and it is completely alien to a modern kitchen. Watching a professional team rebuild a menu inside those limits is one of the genuinely interesting things series five did.

The Village Perspective

Asthall is small, and small villages feel this kind of thing acutely. Extra trade helps some people and simply means traffic for others, and nobody living there voted on whether their pub should become a national attraction. The same tension has played out around the Diddly Squat Farm Shop near Chadlington. If you visit either, the decent thing is to park properly, keep the noise down and remember that the postcode on your satnav is somebody’s address.

Final Thoughts

The Farmer’s Dog is a village pub in Asthall with an unusually stubborn idea behind it: buy British, or do not buy at all. It opened to hundreds of people queueing and has been hard work ever since, which is exactly what running a pub is. If you go, book ahead, order the food and think for a moment about where it came from. That was rather the point.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is The Farmer’s Dog pub?

It is in Asthall, a small village in the Oxfordshire Cotswolds, near Burford and a short drive from the Diddly Squat farm.

Who owns The Farmer’s Dog?

Jeremy Clarkson owns the pub. He bought and reopened it, with the process filmed for series four of Clarkson’s Farm.

When did The Farmer’s Dog open?

It reopened on 23 August 2024. Hundreds of customers queued for hours on the first day.

What is special about the menu?

Everything is sourced from British farms. No imported ingredients are used, which limits the menu but supports domestic producers.

Do you need to book at The Farmer’s Dog?

Booking is strongly advised, particularly for food and around the release of a new series, when demand rises sharply.

Is the pub in Clarkson’s Farm series 5?

Yes. Series 5, released on 3 June 2026, followed the ongoing challenges of running the pub after its opening.

Disclaimer: This article is for general information. Opening hours, menus and booking arrangements change, so check the pub’s own channels before travelling. Please park considerately and respect the village of Asthall when visiting.