Tule Royal Wedding, PLANNING A ROYAL WEDDING 2: THE CATERING

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PLANNING A ROYAL WEDDING 2:  THE CATERING
Jessica Hart

So, there you are, having found your prince, and you’ve decided when and where to get married.  But even trickier decisions lie ahead.  What about the reception?  Where will that be? What will you serve your guests and who will sit where?  Pity poor royal brides for whom the seating plan involves an extraordinarily complicated protocol dictating that a princess must be seated above a duchess, a duke above a lord and so on.

Harry and Meghan’s wedding reception in St George’s Hall will avoid the need for a super complicated seating plan

After their wedding and a carriage procession through Windsor, Prince Harry and his bride will join their guests for a reception in St George’s Hall at Windsor Castle.  This spectacular hall is used on occasion for state banquets, and up to 160 guests can be seated around the table, but a reception with canapés and champagne will avoid the headache of a seating plan altogether.

 

The Upper Ward at Windsor Castle, with the entrance to St George’s Hall on the left

After the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton in April 2011, the Queen hosted a reception for 650 guests at Buckingham Palace. Over 10,000 canapes were prepared for that occasion by the royal chef and his team, who will also cater Prince Harry’s wedding in the Great Kitchen at Windsor Castle.  The kitchen dates back to the fourteenth century and is one of the oldest working kitchens in the world – although fortunately its equipment is definitely twenty-first century.

 

A working kitchen is no place for faint-hearted cooks.

Royal events are run with a meticulous attention to detail, and the canapés are likely to make a mouth-watering display: at William and Kate’s wedding the canapés included miniature Cornish pasties, mouthfuls of bubble and squeak with confit of lamb and tiny smoked haddock fishcakes.

That menu provided the inspiration for chef Flora Deare, bridesmaid to Hope Kennard at her wedding to Prince Jonas. Hope opts for a simple country wedding – or as simple as a royal wedding can be – and Flora has promised to do the catering.  Although she has vowed to give her friend exactly the wedding she wants, Flora can’t help hoping to inject a little style into the food too.  At a rather awkward dinner with Ally, Max and the super cool Count Fredrik, Flora trials a selection of canapés for the wedding: “Smoked salmon on a beetroot blini, miniature Yorkshire puddings with rare roast beef and a horseradish mousse, and those are walnut sables,” she tells the others, although she’s frustrated by Max, Hope’s brother, who would, as she says, be perfectly happy to serve the royal party “a bag of crisps and some dips”.

Wiltshire in June: the backdrop to Hope’s ‘simple, country, royal wedding’.
Hasebury Hall was based on Avebury Manor.

Harry and Meghan’s guests in St George’s Hall will be served by liveried footmen, but Hope and Jonas celebrate their wedding in a marquee in the grounds of Hasebury Hall, the ancient manor house where Hope grew up and where Max now lives.  Rather smaller than Windsor Castle, Hasebury Hall has plenty of history of its own, and a large kitchen that is just what Flora needs to plan the royal wedding menu while keeping her cake-making business going on the side.

Flora’s cake-making business means she badly needs to use Max’s kitchen

She and Max come to an agreement: she will use the kitchen in the run up to Hope’s wedding, and as Max’s cooking is limited to opening a can, he’ll hardly know that she’s there.  But somehow it doesn’t turn out like that …

You can read Flora and Max’s story in The Baronet’s Wedding Engagement, free this month on Bookbub!

* Photos from Bigstock or authors’ own

 

Jessica Hart is the author of more than 60 romances. She also writes historical novels under her real name, Pamela Hartshorne, and non-fiction, including most recently – and coincidentally – a history of Windsor Castle.

Find out more about Jessica at her website www.jessicahart.co.uk or keep in touch on Twitter @JessicaHartXX.

14 Comments

  1. I can’t wait to read this book & I’m so looking forward to watching the royal wedding on TV, May 19th. Thanks for your generosity.

  2. It sounds like the wedding will be a bit different , as they are doing things their way and they are delightful and so natural in their love . Thanks

  3. I’m looking forward to seeing the bride’s dress as well as those of her wedding party. The jewelry should be fabulous.

  4. I’m lookibg forward to seeing the cake and flowers and of course the brides dress. Thank you for the chance.

  5. Her gown but I just want to see this couple on their wedding day. They are so in love. The book sounds wonderful and look forward to reading it.

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