We had our first ever book group meeting last night – thanks to everyone who came along. I’m glad to say we’ve got a real mix of people (including some men) and had fun discussing how we’re going to run the group and what books we’re going to read.

For October’s meeting we’ve given ourselves a choice of two of the books shortlisted for the Man Booker 2009 Prize – The Children’s Book by A S Byatt and The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters. We’re going to experiment with various ways of chosing our reading list for the first few months to see what works for us. Of course, we had plenty of tea and cakes to keep us going. Must say a big thanks to Sara Sheridan for coming along to chat about her new book The Secret Mandarin, which has just been published. We’ll keep you posted on how we get on.

Finally, we’re taking part in the World’ Biggest Coffee Morning tomorrow (Friday) in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support. We’ll be selling raffle tickets all day for some great prizes, including an eteaket Afternoon Tea for Two voucher, some Missoni goods, a Versace laptop bag and an eteaket gift box. All our tips for the day will also be donated so please pop in (41 Frederick St) and support us. Thanks!

Sara Sheridan’s new book The Secret Mandarin is out tomorrow. eteaket have been working with Sara to create a unique Secret Mandarin tea blend, which we served as tea cocktails at the book launch in the National Library of Scotland last Friday.

We also took part in a discussion evening with Sara at Stockbridge library on Monday – a big thanks to everyone who came along and took part.

Sara has kindly agreed to do a reading from her new book at eteaket’s first book group meeting on Wed 23 Sept. Please get in touch if you’re interested in attending.

Finally, there are still some places left for our Tea Tasting evening on Wed 30 Sept. To find out more and to book, please click here.

Finally, someone has invented a biscuit specially designed for dunking.

The Worcester Feast Dunker has been created to avoid the horrible problem of biscuit mush in the bottom of your cup. Apparently it lasts for a staggering 6 minutes. The previous record was held by a chocolate digestive which survived a dunking for a measly 25 secs. Click here to read more.

We had a lot of fun on Friday serving 100 Afternoon Teas for a special Made in Scotland event at Dance Base as part of the festival. Big thanks to Sophie, Thom and Stef for making all the sandwiches. Here are some pictures from the day – Angela and Mhaire were the stars of the show with their jamming and tea cocktail skills. And where would we be without Margaret’s cakestands – all available in eteaket for only £38.99.