It all kicked off at 8.30pm; the toasts were made, the caterer installed in the kitchen, the disco set up; Patrick, the organiser, looked very nervous. It was, after all, the first New Year’s Eve do that he’d organised. The people started to arrive; Patrick served everybody their first glass of Pousse Rapiere and arranged for the toasts to be brought to the aperos table.

By about 10.30, everybody had arrived, the toasts had nearly all been eaten and people were ready to start on the serious business of the meal. The first course was served at 11pm; fresh foie gras with a sweet white wine, followed by noix St. Jacques and mushroom risotto with a dry white wine, accompanied by a lot of silliness and hilarity, party hats, blow guns with sticky boules for ammo, party poppers, streamers, etc.

We’d finished the starters by just before midnight, so everyone moved to the dance floor to see in the new Year. It seemed very strange not to sing Auld Lang Syne. We danced for a while before the “trou Gascon” (Gascony hole) arrived; a boule of ice cream in white armagnac; it smelled pretty potent! Then the main course was served; chapon wrapped in pancetta, served with potatoes dauphinoise, stuffed tomatoes and red wine. Another dance break, to let the food go down, before cheese and salad, followed by a platter of desserts and champagne, at about 2.30am. All topped off, of course, with coffee and armagnac.

There were lots of traditional songs which had to be sung while standing on your chair, waving your serviette over your head, or swaying wildly, hanging on to your neighbour, and lots of silly dances to be danced, to the strains of real French disco music. Oh, how we longed for some decent music to dance to; the French may be great in the kitchen, but their musical ability is next to non-existent; all base and noise, and it all sounded the same!

We stayed till 5am, by which time there were about 40 revellers remaining; I don’t know what time they served the onion soup, but the last person went home at 8.30 this morning. We went to help with the clean-up operation; there were about 20 turned up, so it didn’t take long; then we all sat down to another meal, with, yes, lots of wine and armagnac, and all promised to help with the annual fete at the beginning of September. At least there’s time to recover by then!