Here's how to spend Red Nose day - in the kitchen of Murano with the team all donning bright conkers in the appropriate fashion. Chef proprietor Angela Hartnett ensured the right look was worn by all, including manager Jose Garcia (front middle) and sommelier Marc-Andrea Levy (top right, in tie). You look great, chaps and ladies.
In November, Kitchen Rat revealed that The Hotel du Vin in Brighton was launching a free drinks Happy Hour promotion for three consecutive Wednesdays, starting 3 December.
House beer, wines and spirits will all be free between 5.30 - 6.30pm for three Wednesdays, but with two caveats:
Punters will have to dress up at Father Christmas (or an Elf) and bring a children's gift with them, worth about a tenner.
The hotel will donate all the gifts to a local children's hospital in time for Christmas Eve.
Phil Lewis, general manager of the Brighton Hotel du Vin, has now got in touch with a progress report.
"The first two Wednesdays have gone quite well. The first week the whole housekeeping team dressed in full Santa costume for the whole day and raised £350 for the local Argus newspaper appeal, before joining six other Santas in the bar at 5pm.
"The second week we had about 15 Santas show up from as far afield as London and Cheltenham all bringing with them gifts for disadvantaged children.
"We have one more week to go (17th), so fingers crossed we will be able to improve on the two weeks gone by."
Good work chaps.
