There is a saying in my family that goes back fifty years...

“One Sherry before 11 or eleven before 1”. And I have watched at family lunches as an uncle or cousin has returned from the cellar armed with a bottle of cream, ready and more than willing to pay the penalty for having missed the curfew. As I got older, I stopped being offered soda-streams and was introduced to the world of alcohol instead. Before lunch would become the “Mackaskie Special” – a mix of gin, Dubonnet and Angosturas bitters, or maybe some scrumpy from the barrel if someone had been to Somerset and always plenty of wine at lunch...