Pinkies aloft! High tea fundraiser for Nunavut food security

Tickets for the Jan. 24 “high tea” event at the Iqaluit soup kitchen are $30 per person, and those attending are encouraged to bring food donations as well. There will be two seatings: one at 1 p.m. and the other at 2:30 p.m. (PHOTO BY THOMAS ROHNER)

If you’re a generous person who’s dreamed of drinking tea with the Queen — sipping from fine china with your pinky raised — then you’ll want to check out a fundraiser Jan. 24 at Iqaluit’s soup kitchen.

Her Majesty won’t be attending, but a high tea social event will still unfold, featuring delicate finger foods and tea served in fancy teacups.

“You don’t hear of many high teas happening in town, but they’re always fun,” organizer Ashli McCarthy said Jan. 18.

And it’s all for an important cause, she added.

“There’s always so much in the media these days about food security and the high cost of food prices, so it’s important for things like the Soup Kitchen and Food Bank to be around. They can always use donations and events like this to help support them, to raise money.”

McCarthy said local retailers have donated food ingredients for the event, meaning that every penny raised Jan. 24 will go directly to the Iqaluit Food Centre — home to both the soup kitchen and the food bank.

Besides serving three kinds of tea — orange pekoe, peppermint and green — there will be homemade scones and other desserts served alongside sandwiches, which, according to custom, are cut into exquisite quarters.

There’s no dress code encouraged for the event, McCarthy said, but as high teas are traditionally held on Sunday afternoons, people often wear their “Sunday best.”

Tickets for the event are $30 per person, and those attending are encouraged to bring food donations as well.

There will be two seatings for the high tea Jan. 24 — one at 1 p.m. and another at 2:30 p.m.

For more information, or to buy a ticket, you can email McCarthy at iqaluit.tea.party@gmail.com.