Friday 26/3 saw Joe Burroughs from Howes Percival give a riveting talk on his experiences as a Lawyer appointed to various public inquiries including ‘Bloody Sunday’ ‘Dr Harold Shipman’ and ‘Baha Mousa’ in Iraq. All highly interesting and gory!
Carl lamb from Almary Green entertained us over February’s Light Lunch held at The Last Wine Bar. He gave us a fascinating insight into taking part in the 1980’s Falkland’s War. Carl was a fighter controller in the RAF and was directly involved in carrying out some of the difficult decisions our Nation’s Leaders made to protect the islands. A good crowd attended with plenty of new faces and lunch was fab as well.
Wed 24/2 saw the return of Howard Lee and his experimental Asian Influenced cooking. Firstly we tried combining unusual flavour combinations in the form of small but punchy canapés, followed by his own cured salmon and homemade soda bread. The main course was slow cooked pork (6 hours at a low temperature) with crackling and a beautifully seasoned mushroom. Our palette cleanser was a shot glass filled with both tomato and cucumber sorbets and the meal was finished off with rose flavoured rice pudding topped with a greenish tapioca with a rose panacotta on the side.
All very Heston Blumenthal, in fact Howard’s chef even looked like him – spooky
Friday 29/1/2010 was the first of our Light Lunches for this new decade, and who better to kick off the series but a regular and popular speaker Harry Mitchell! In Harry’s own words he has turned from poacher to gamekeeper having left Radio Broadland’s Newsroom to become the custodian of the Police’s reputation in Norfolk (their Press Officer). He gave a fantastic and informative talk to a good crowd of regulars and newcomers.
The 2009 Christmas Lunch, after some late changes to the date, venue and content, went very well with almost 80 members and guests packed into the Eaton Suite at Dunston Hall – which being baronial and beamed was just right for a Christmas bash! EDP Young Entrepreneur of the Year, Richard Burton of Hood Easy was the special guest speaker and was joined Chair Nick Farrow to talk about being in business ‘now’- Richard’s business is just a year old – and ‘then’ as Farrows celebrated its 30th year in business in 2009.
A wide ranging a jolly discussion kept the audience amused with personal insights on politics, media and the economy.
The Big raffle – with a one in 6 chance of winning something, and the table raffles for mini coolers – all donated by sponsors and the committee – raised a huge pile of cash which Barclays agreed to ‘money match’ – so we hope to raise almost £2,000 for the Hamlet Centre, the branch’s charity of the year.
