Weddings and birthday parties are far from the limits of our catering. Hog Roast Orchard Park are honoured to provide for all sorts of events, from the classics to the obscure. Imagine, then, how delighted we were to be asked to cater for the annual meeting of the Orchard Park Young Astronomer’s Society.
The society have met every August from 1950 to the present day. A variety of important events take place – new members are welcomed, the latest space science discoveries are discussed, and of course the group take the opportunity to point their telescopes up towards the night sky.
It seemed as if the ongoing situation with COVID-19 might bring a halt to this year’s celebration; at Hog Roast Orchard Park we were proud to be able to help make sure that the TYAS annual meeting took place.
We travelled twenty-five miles to a low-light pollution area – that’s an area away from artificial street and city lights, where celestial objects like stars are much easier to view. As ever, we were happy to adjust our set-up to match our clients’ needs. In this case, we needed to alter our light set-up for the group; we used red bulbs instead of our usual white, as these are known to help human eyes adjust to the night sky.
There were fifty hungry mouths to feed, so we cooked an entire pig with all of the trimmings. There were also sauces, stuffing and a whole constellation of side dishes such as our herby potatoes and salads. Many vegetarians also attended, for whom we were pleased to provide delicious veggie alternatives such as halloumi skewers and grilled vegetables.
After everyone’s appetites were satisfied, we served drinks. There was plenty of time to compare equipment; some keen engineers were curious about our spit roasting machines, and we were privileged to be allowed to use the groups’ telescopes to observe the cosmos. We were shown the planet Jupiter, the Orion Nebula and the magnificent Andromeda Galaxy.