A culinary star hidden in the lakes

History and cloud hang heavy in the Lake District. Fortunately, in the south of the National Park, they escaped the worst of the November flooding.

When we visited the rain held off and the sun shone seductively on the ancient green fells as they tumbled down into old, stone villages before finally giving way to the majestic and yes, sometimes mortal, expanses of Morecambe Bay.

Cartmel, just a mile or two from the sea, is graced by the 800-year-old priory and a Georgian square. It should be a bastion of chintz, yet under the arch of the medieval town wall you will find a culinary equivalent of a mad professor's science lab in a converted 13th century stable.

So innovative is the Aulis food research centre across the yard from L'enclume, the Michelin-starred restaurant with rooms, that even Heston Blumenthal must be feeling the heat. But if snail porridge does not appeal, fear not.

Chef Simon Rogan's culinary experiments draw inspiration from the uplands and shoreline around him to produce dishes that are adventurous, but still witty and local.

If the dishes on his 8, 13, or 17-course tasting menus sound poetic — fig in vanilla, sweet cicely, balm and wild juniper — perhaps that is because he employs both an expert forager and a food historian.

Rogan and his team walk the hills in search of such culinary treasures as sweet woodruff, melilot, wild garlic, fat hen, chickweed and elderberries.

This attention to detail is clearly why Rogan was hailed Best Chef in the UK by the Good Food Guide 2009.

But he still has plans to improve. Rogan is using his own 13.5-acre organic smallholding to ensure he has access to the freshest, most seasonal produce.

As well as the kitchen garden, Rogan draws deeply on the rugged landscape around him. One of his signature dishes, Humphrey's Pool, is named after a rock pool on one of the peninsulas in Morecambe Bay, created by the paths of the five rivers that feed into the Irish Sea.

Served in a deep pool-shaped bowl, at first the depths of the dish are obscured by swirling strands of edible seaweed. But dive into the delicate brine and you discover tiny morsels of rock-pool life at the bottom as if you had somehow caught them yourself with a net.