An example Corporate Day:
Courses start at 9.30am with a brief introduction, followed by knife skills and preparations for a five/six course lunch (sample menus below). The lunch party starts with a glass of bubbly and canapés, wine can be served during lunch and the meal concludes with cheese and port (optional) followed by fresh coffee and petits fours.
After lunch guests are welcome to relax in the garden or to have more formal tour of the kitchen garden, or can make use of the Swallows Nest facilities - perhaps for a presentation or awards etc.
During the afternoon guests can bake cakes or biscuits – this can be run as a competition and in the past we’ve had cups presented for the best cake!
The day concludes somewhere between 4:00pm and 5:30pm when guests take home cakes or biscuits made on the day, along with a goodie bag containing an Orchards Cookery Book, apron, tea towel and mug.
Sample Menu 1
Sample Menu 2
Champagne & canapés : Quail Egg & Caviar Nests
Starter : Smoked Salmon & Prawn Méli-mélo
Main : Beef Wellington
Vegetarian option : Spring Rolls with Chilli Sauce
Potato : Dauphinoise Potatoes
Vegetable 1 : Roasted Carrots with Orange & Tarragon
Vegetable 2 : Broccoli with Buttered Almonds
Pudding : Chocolate Meringue Roulade with Morello Cherries / Raspberry Meringue Roulade
Cheese board & Port : Five different cheeses eg. Stilton, Pie D’Angloys, Cheddar
Coffee (cappuccino, espresso, latté etc,) & petite fours : Orange Almond Splinters
"By far the best corporate day I’ve Event Managed and been involved in. Great place, great team, great day."
Jimmy Franks, The Big Blanket Event Management
"Liked it [the Designer Dinners Course] so much last time I’m back and brought the company with me!... Thank you for a great Corporate Day, the staff absolutely loved it."
Jeff Bethray, Oxford Media & Business School
"The best team event ever."
Sarah Jennings, Royal Bank of Canada
"We’ve had a very successful reader event at The Orchards Cookery School. Readers enjoyed a day of cooking in the schools kitchens.... A great day was had by all and I was astounded as to how much they fitted into the day."
Tamsin Westhorpe, Editor English Country Garden, June 2010