"We take the traditions of Burns Night and give them a Black Country twist" - Essington Farm gets ready to celebrate life of Robert Burns with annual toast to haggis

It will also give Mr Simkin the chance to give his traditional reading of the Robert Burns poem "Address to a Haggis" in a Black Country dialect.

He said that the translated version had come about after going to Burns Night events in the past and struggling to understand the reading of the poem, which is written in the Scots language.

He said: "When I was going out with my wife, her parents were members of the Caledonian Society in Wolverhampton and the highlight of the social calendar was the Burns Dinner every January.

"I would go to these events and I would never understand a single word of the address to the haggis, so after we got married and sitting at home on a cold winters night, I got out a copy of the address and translated it into the Black Country dialect.

"It became a party piece and then, when we opened our tea room and started having Burns Night events about 15 years ago, it just seemed like the perfect opportunity to give the event a special cultural flavour and so I started doing the address every year and it's become a tradition."

The event features a march with the haggis, which is made at the farm, to bagpipe music, then the address read by Mr Simkin, and also has a menu full of Scottish favourites, such as Scotch broth and Raspberry Cranachan.

Mr Simkin said the event was always popular, with the timing of it being a month after Christmas, and said he was still thrilled to be able to run the event after so many years.

He said: "It's great fun and we get a lot of people coming back year after year after year, with one of our regulars saying that he had come so many times, he could almost remember the address off by heart.

"It's also great because it's not as formal as a traditional Burns Night event as we don't do all the addresses and toast to the memory of Robert Burns, which is nice, but can also be interminable.

"I think it's just the right time after Christmas as everyone has had the feast and used all the leftovers and had a few nights in and think to themselves that they'd like to do something nice again."

Tickets are still available for the event on January 24 at £36.95 each, with doors opening at 6.45pm for a 7.15pm start.

To book a place, either go to the tea room in Essington Farm or call 01902 735724.