Last night I sat down to dinner with 27 ladies.
These included two counsellers who work at the well woman's centre, one english and one asian(who wore a beautiful sari), a couple of office workers, a nurse, a syrian waitress, a flute and sax teacher, a self-employed bridal jewellery maker, a bus driver and one other supermarket worker(checkouts I think).

Where were we and what were we doing there?
Well, we were in Leeds at 'Fairuz' lebanese restaurant which is situated close to the Merrion centre.
We were there at the invite of Kathy who I know through my dance class, it was her 40th birthday so as well as having a family celebration she decided to ask various women friends from all areas of her life for a get together over dinner. I only knew two of the ladies but by the time we were through we were all on nodding terms

The food was great we had an assortment of mezzes for starters, feta cheese, hummous, a beetroot dip, aubergine, tahini, etc.There were fresh mediterranean vegetables with lashings of garlic and olive oil. My favourite cold dish was grape leaf dolma, these were vegetarian with veg and rice stuffed inside, they were scrumptious and I must have eaten at least five

The hot dishes included charcoaled chicken breast, spicy lamb meatballs in a tomato sauce, a beany stew and a couscous concoction which were all delicious.
For dessert we had a semolina pudding (don't know what it is called) which was flavoured with rose water and contained nuts (pistachio, I think) and finally we finished off with strong turkish coffee. The rest of the ladies partook of copious amounts of vino but being teetotal myself I abstained.

Nevertheless, when the promised belly dancer failed to materialise, it was left to me and Kathy to provide the 'floor entertainment' We wiggled our hips and did a few camels
Hardly in the same league as the absent professional although kathy can strut her stuff and she cajoled a few of the wine drinkers to make a fool of themselves along with us
Gawd knows what the other diners in the restaurant thought but tactfully no-one objected.