BURN'S NIGHT

BURN'S NIGHT SUPPER

27.20.2012

Burn's Night! We set up and laid the tables yesterday and all the cooking is done so all we have to do today is collect the bread and plug in the slow cookers. J and B are cooking the haggis, neeps and tatties and that will go into the hostess trolley so no-one should be in the kitchen at all after about 6pm.

5pm Our friends have not arrived yet. I hope they left enough time for the journey as they are bringing the vegan haggis for the non meat eaters.

6pm U arrives, rather late.. ….hold up on the motorway. He's our MC and a genuine Scot.  He changes hastily into his kilt etc and we then discover we need a lead to connect the laptop to the church music system. Completely forgotten about the vagaries of our system.  Desperate phone call and one arrives.

Still no sign of our friends. We finish setting up. I fit in 2 extra places, 1 I'd forgotten about and 1 for a favour to a friend. The trifles have arrived safely, including an enormous one which will feed at least 20.  The cheese and oat cakes are ready so all we need are the people.

7.15pm folk are beginning to arrive, some in highland garb and most clutching bottles of wine and whisky. Looks like it will be a good night.

7.30pm We should be starting but as the chap doing one of the speeches is not here yet we'll have to wait a bit. Our friends have arrived and so their haggis goes into the microwave. What did we do before microwaves?

At last everyone, bar 2, is here so we start. Introductions for those who have never experienced a Burn's Night Supper  followed by good homemade soup. The missing 2 arrive and tuck in. There's a quiz for folk to do as the evening goes on, prize a bottle of whisky and people are getting going on that. U asks if we have organised the haggis procession and of course we've forgotten so friend and son are hastily instructed and 4 bottles of whisky borrowed. One has been opened so let's hope it doesn't leak.

The address to the haggis leaves many bemused (most of us are not Scots) but we laugh as the friend, son and U knock back their whisky in one (son was not expecting that!) and we all join in with more moderate sips. The meal continues, haggis course followed by beef / chicken casserole, then trifle, cheese, biscuits and coffee.

So then to the speeches. The address to the lassies is a lovely tribute to we ladies. My reply is a bit more barbed, filled out with jokes sent via the internet, but it seems to be received OK. Then we have a couple of songs and U does his tribute to Rabbie Burns. The quiz is sorted and the prizes awarded. The dirty plates etc are piled into bags ready to go to the vicarage dishwasher and the dancing commences with a Gay Gordon's.

As the evening and drinking continue the dancing becomes increasingly hilarious and folk who didn't think they could dance or would want to dance discover that actually they can and so they do.  Eventually we realisse we will have to finish to allow folk to get home so Auld Lang Syne it is.

11.30pm Time to stagger home and load the dishwasher. Everyone seems to have had an excellent time so we book U for the last Friday in January 2013 and put out the empties.

As we leave my friend S, who did a lot of the cooking, suggests a barn dance. What a good idea. We'll have to look into it.

useful links

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Burnshttp
www.robertburns.org/works/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/robertburns