highway farm bed and breakfast and self-catering

Supporting UK Charities and supporting people in Africa.
Inspired by KISS COOK BOOK!
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UPDATE……………..Over £30,000 raised for our chosen charities.
20/12/11
Well done to the wreath-making ladies! We held another charity Christmas wreath-making day here on the 26th November, it was a fun day and busy with over 50 ladies who came along to support! Lots of activity and chat followed by bacon butties, mulled cider to keep us going and carols. The ladies all took one wreath and I sold the other wreaths and raised £750 which together with the raffle money from Eype Makers Market enabled me to send £1000 to the Dorchester Hospital digital mammography scanner Appeal.
Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and thank you to all for the continued support. A Happy New Year too.

UPDATE……………..Over £29,000 raised for our chosen charities.
8/10/11

Wonderful Wedding day for Lucy & Simon and Party time for John!
With the help of a brilliant Auctioneer, friend David, who armed with a microphone and top hat borrowed from the band auctioned
all the produce from our Church Harvest Festival.
Many thanks to our lovely family and friends who rose to the occasion and over £660 was raised.
£200 for Symondsbury Church and the rest to Lucy's charity in Malawi, The Open Arms Orphanage in Blantyre.
Big Thank You to everyone, happy memories.......

Sunday 3^rd July 2011.

How do you cook and serve 130 full breakfasts in a morning?
NOT without a great deal of help!

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Our 5^th Big Breakfast. We were so very lucky and blessed with the most glorious weather just perfect to sit and enjoy the garden views. Lots of lovely helpers, lots of happy people and we raised £1490.
£1000 for Cancer Research UK from the breakfasts and £250 on the raffle for Symondsbury Church, plus cook book sales and donations, and £240 to The Boost Appeal at Dorchester Hospital who are raising money for a mammogram digital scanner.
Brilliant, I'm delighted! Thank you to everyone, family, friends, neighbours, food suppliers and those who donated a raffle prize. Another GREAT Big Breakfast.
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25/6/11

We sold Bacon Baps at the local Makers Market at Eype Church, the smell of the Denhay bacon was delicious and enjoyed by all! Raised £125 for the Dorchester Scanner Appeal.
Also donated a 2 night B&B to a Charity Auction to support a young lad who was raising money for his special charity‘ Help the Heroes’, good effort.
And of course I continue to sell The Kiss Cook Book to all my guests………… well, not many escape without one!

13/1/11

This is Malawi in the wet season, very green, lush and productive. You can see the tea bushes growing, it’s a busy time of year for the Tea plantations and their workers, 24 hour production and green undulating tea fields as far as the eye can see. This is all going on along either side of the red soiled dusty roads between Blantyre to Mount Mulanje. Lucy’s fiancé is a tea taster and buyer and I have gained some insight from my January trip into the working of the tea trade, meeting some of Simon’s plantation managers, contacts and overseas buyers, plus a very interesting guided tour around one of the biggest tea factories in Africa. When you see the work involved and the numbers of times your tea is sampled and tasted you really must stop and savour your next cuppa!

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Daughter Lucy has set up a small specialist tea company, Chikondi Tea, everything is made in Malawi, very fairtrade supporting the locals in many ways. All the good quality tea is exported, so Lucy sells her products to the guest lodges, hotels, airports and gift shops in Malawi. Chikonda means ‘love’ in Chichewa, love your cuppa! Cheers.

Follow Lucy's Chikonda tea on facebook by clicking this link on facebook.com

Lucy and I are supporting a new small project at the Thylo Estate and the Anglian Communtiy, We have donated money to repair 8 old singer sewing machines that had been donated but were not working. We also supplied materials and cottons and the plan is to set up a workshop in the Community Hall selling the things they make. There is a tailor on site to help and train, and Lucy will help to market and buy her pretty tea bags made in bright beautiful tetnnje materials.

We received a warm and beautiful welcome from Wonderously, yes that is his name! He greeted us on arrival and proudly introduced us a large group gathered in the open classroom. Mostly 3 – 5 years olds with large brown eyes dressed in an assortment of colourful clothes, together with teachers and many elderly who walk in daily for food at lunchtime, the oldest was 92!. They happily sang to us, it lifted our hearts and made us feel very humble. They proudly talked about their project and the work they do and then showed us around the village and their beautiful little white church. It was a memorial visit and I hope the link continues.

27/11/10 Merry Xmas

Christmas wreath time again! The mulled cider is hot and spicy. 60 beautiful wreaths lovingly created by my workshop ladies at another free workshop. In freezing arctic conditions and nearly as cold inside the barn. Snowy horrible icy roads to negotiate but that didn’t stop the ladies from coming along. I was impressed! We had a fun time with lots of chat, carols and creative fun! Sold all 60 Wreaths, some before and some at the December Makers Market held in the beautiful Eype Church for the Arts, £600 to Cancer Research UK. Well done all and thanks.

11/07/10

Our APPLE CAKE stall at the local Makers Market at Eype Church was really fun and successful. Sold all but 2 apple cakes and we ate those!
Delicious and freshly made, together with Cook Books we raised £111 for the Cancer Research.

28/06/10

Our 4 Big Breakfasts have raised £3,030 for CANCER RESEARCH UK!
Total fundraising nearly £25,000. Just a few more Cook Books to sell! 1900 printed so far.

30/05/10
Our 4th Big Breakfast for Cancer Research UK

Phew, what a busy morning!

Pinney's donned and the Aga hot! The sun shone, we were delighted, and many people gathered throughout the morning to support our 4th Big Breakfast for Cancer Research UK. They came for a full Highway Breakfast, enjoying lovely views from the garden with lots of chat and good humour, that's the way to start the day!

My thanks go to our jolly team of helpers, family, friends and neighbours, who joined us once again in support of Cancer Research. Thank you to our local food suppliers and friends for food and raffle contributions and to Kate & Tania who ran willow teepee and fairy sculpture workshops during the morning and to Caroline from Leakers Bakery who came along to judge the Chocolate Brownie competition,not an easy job after eating a cooked breakfast! Together with Kiss Cook Book sales we raised over £1200 for Cancer Research, Whow! see Charity report here

30/12/09. Over £22,000 raised in the 2008 & 2009

My gratitude to fantastic friends and family who have joined in too, supporting in many different ways to make it all possible and all the lovely guests who have bought my Cook Book! It’s been a fun and busy time and very rewarding with lots of spin off’s in so many different ways. I am sure there will be more to come! Of course, throughout the year, I have continued to sell Cook Books and I’m still selling!

Fund raising in 2009 started with another Big Breakfast in March when John and I donned our pinnies and with help from friends cooked over 70 yummy breakfasts.
An Easter Cake Stall followed at The Spyway Inn. All the delicious cakes on sell were made and given by the ladies from the Kiss Ball committee.
In September we held ‘A Bit of a Symondsbury Village Do’ and filled a wedding marquee with locals who kindly donated most of the food and their wonderful talents provided some hilarious entertainment!
A very good fun evening was enjoyed by all.

45 stunning Christmas wreaths were lovingly created by my workshop ladies at a free Xmassy workshop. There was lots of chat, carols and creative fun! We sold them at the new December Makers Market held in the beautiful venue of Eype Church for the Arts.
It was wonderfully festive, and a friendly atmosphere for our 50 talented local makers to display and sell. There will be more to come…………. please see the Arts page for dates and ideas.

We donated money to Poole Hospital from our new Strictly Dancing Group, Dorset-style!
Well not a lot of style but it’s been fun, friendly and at times challenging!

Donations made to:
Cancer Research UK www.cancerresearchuk.org
KISS it Better Appeal at Great Ormond Street, for children with cancer
www.gosh.org/kiss-it-better
Dorset & Somerset Air Ambulance www.dorsetandsomersetairambulance.org.uk
Lake Malawi; Chembe Water Project and other village projects
Symondsbury Churches
The Wallbridge Trust, parish fund.
Dorset Weldmar Trust, our local hospice.
Poole Hospital, oncology unit.

Our daughter Lucy has been living and working in Malawi, ' the warm heart of Africa'.
She and boyfriend Simon lived beside the beautiful Lake Malawi at Cape Maclear, both working in sustainable
tourism. Eco- friendly islands of Mumbo & Domwe, www.kayakafrica.net
and Gecko Lounge, for friendly accommodation at the lake. www.geckolounge.net
Both businesses employing over 60 locals and are closely involved with the families in the village.

NEW - an exciting new project in Cape Maclear called The Chembe Village Community Project Centre.
The idea is to create an 'umbrella' that covers all of the already existing projects in the village in order to raise awareness and bring in funding to benefit the whole village. The Projects that are involved have proven to be successful and have shown a great deal of commitment to their cause. (www.chembeprojects.moonfruit.com)

30/4/10
£1000 to MOTHER & CHILD. Run by Dutch doctor, Jeanette van Os who runs the Billy Rhiordian Clinic.
Mother and Child – its very small scale charity, just operating in Cape Maclear and Jeanette is supported by friends and family. The money enables her to offer more than the clinic can. If pregnant women are having a difficult labour she provides transport money for them to go to Monkey bay. There’s a feeding programme for malnourished under 5's, its pays for milk for women who are unable to breast feed or have HIV so should not be breast feeding, and pays for vulnerable children who she suspects are HIV positive (but they cannot test for in the village) to be tested and their blood samples to be sent to Lilongwe for testing so they can be put on ARV (AIDS treatments) sooner. She’s a busy doctor working hard to improve the health of her local community.

2008 UPDATE. Over £16500 raised for our chosen charities.
4/10/08 Good News! The KISS Charity Ball held on 20th September
at Highway Farm raises over £11,500!

We seated 300 guests in an amazing festival marquee. The event exceeded all our expectations!
It was a real accolade to local people working together. An amazing evening, delighted with the local support
from businesses and a great gathering together of friends and family.
We had a fantastic time and raised lots of money for our charities, chosen by our committee ladies, a group of
friends who came together and were inspired!

Malawi News
29/4/08 Our first donation has gone to help complete the building of a new house for James and also will help Articles, local Handy/ DIY man. He is bringing up his nephews and the money will go towards their education and school uniform for the next 2 terms. There is also the on-going work of The Chembe Water and Malaria Projects. www.chembewaterproject.org whose aim is to provide safe drinking water for the people in Cape Maclear
2/9/08 Simon and I went to a football match in the village on Sunday - using your football posts, probably over 2000 people watching - pitch invasion after every goal. Anyway our team, Bad Bays, won 5-2! They have put their prize money towards football boots!
23/11/08 From Lucy - Brilliant effort! 2 projects I would like to support with the money donated, start of phase 3 Chembe Water Project at traditional fishing village of Msaka (very poor, no tourists and high incidence of infant mortality, dysentery etc) - we could give this a real boost I think! I would also like to support Vision with his orphanage-feeding programme. He is a great guy based in the village and he feeds about 60 orphans every day, they have a garden, so grow and sell veg to help, and £25 a month would make a huge difference.

KISS COOK BOOK

Full of yummy, easy recipes, local, seasonal ideas and useful, tried and tested cooking tips.
KISS, stands for ‘Keep It So Simple’, I like feeding people but don’t want to be in the kitchen all day!

This being River Cottage country, our resident food writer, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, described as a shining and shaggy beacon of good food sense, has reminded us, and you do sometimes forget, that we are very fortunate, indeed blessed, to live here in West Dorset. It’s a wonderful location for everything, especially fine food with multiple food producers and a posse of fine eating-places and interesting food outlets. I value the importance of shopping locally and actively support local businesses, where we can help promote one another.

P.S. We have sold over 1800 cook books - and you can still buy a KISS Cook Book!

A recipe for you to try:
Old Fashioned Bread and Butter Pudding:

Oven 180C, gas mark 4, Aga – top oven, second shelf under the cold metal shelf.

8oz/225g bread, brown and white, crusts off.
10fl oz/ 275ml milk
2oz/ 50g butter, melted
3oz/ 75g brown sugar, mixture of browns
2 tsp mixed spice
1 egg, beaten
6oz/ 175g mixed dried fruit; sultanas, plump raisins, currants, peel, cranberries
grated rind of ½ a orange and freshly grated nutmeg
Optional; a little chopped crystallised ginger

Break bread into pieces and place in a bowl and pour over milk, stir well and leave to soak for 30 mins.
Add melted butter, sugars, spice and beaten egg, beat mixture with a fork until no lumps remain.
Stir in the fruit and orange rind and pour into an 8” square greased or lined dish, grate over nutmeg.
Cook for 1 – 1¼ hours. Serve hot with custard or cream, also nice cold.

Bon Appetite