Our Care for a Cuppa campaign returns this May, with supporters across the community holding coffee mornings and afternoon teas to raise money for their local hospice. And this year, we're delighted to have a very special person supporting the event.

For those of you who watch the Great British Bake Off (which as far as we can tell is almost everybody in the world!) you'll no doubt know that Prue Leith has been announced as the newest judge for the upcoming season. Prue is one of the country's leading cookery experts, with a career stretching back decades. She's made her name as a restauranteur, cookery writer, television presenter, and novelist, and now that she's joined the world's most famous cookery programme, she's encouraging you to get involved in our Care for a Cuppa event to raise money for your local hospice.

Prue said;

‘Care for a Cuppa’ is the newest Katharine House initiative and it has been going like a bomb since 2014. This year it will run from 8–14 May with events large and small in homes, clubs and societies, village and town halls, and in the canteens of many local businesses across north Oxfordshire and south Northamptonshire. Most people opt for a traditional afternoon tea or coffee morning, but there are variations such as a ‘Breakfast Bap Cuppa’ or ‘Care for a Cocktail’. Katharine House Hospice in Adderbury will hold its own ‘Care for a Cuppa’ event on its Open Day on May 12th. I Hope you can join in the Cuppa campaign by organising your own event or coming along to the one at the Hospice.'

For twenty five years Katharine House has provided professional but friendly and warm palliative care, along with a lot of sympathy, comfort and, yes, fun for the patient, plus help and understanding for the families. The hospice charges nothing. There is a ten-bed inpatient unit with two family rooms, a day hospice, and staff can look after people at home too.  

 

Needless to say, all this needs MONEY! The team at Katharine House has turned fund-raising into something that people enjoy doing. And they do it extraordinarily well, dreaming up endlessly imaginative fund-raising events. They have a legacy scheme, a local lottery, and each July they hold a Midnight Walk through the streets of Banbury, a very social merry event. They need to be energetic fundraisers: the hospice and its services cost £3.6 million to run and they only get a third of that from public funds, leaving almost £7,000 to be found every day.

 

Prue has also given us a very special cake recipe for this year's campaign, you can download this and other recipes ready for your event here.

Whether you're an individual, a group, or a business, we hope you'll get involved and hold a Care for a Cuppa event and help make a real difference to people facing life limiting illness in our community. We'll send you a pack to get you started, and you can always download more information from our website.

For further information on this year's Care for a Cuppa campaign, please visit: www.khh.org.uk/cuppa

To sign up to hold your event, please email [email protected] or call 01295 816 484.