HARVINGTON Hall will be throwing open its doors for the last event in this year's calendar - an Elizabethan Christmas evening.

Staff have rolled back more than 400 years of history in their research into authentic recipes and, as far as can be deduced, decorations as well as costumes. Jean Bibbey prepares for the Elizabethan evening at Harvington Hall.

The moated, timbered Elizabethan building, which is to feature in a BBC Blue Peter Christmas special, is renowned for its many ingenious 'priest holes' or secret hideaways.

Tomorrow's event includes traditional Elizabethan food, such as roast turkey and salmon, period decorations, as well as music by minstrels.

The event, which is fully booked, heralds a packed programme which has been drawn up for 2002 at the historic manor house.

Events include four chronologically arranged "living history" weekends which start with the Middle Ages and move through Elizabethan times and the Civil War.

A final "journey through time" will take visitors through rooms of different ages.