A Highland Feast at Greyfriars Kirk: Story Feast Arrives in Edinburgh
The Story Feast long table for this Highland feast will run the length of the 400 year old nave
Greyfriars Kirk opened in 1620.
It was the first church built in Edinburgh after the Reformation, raised on land that Mary, Queen of Scots had granted for burials a half-century earlier. The kirkyard had already been receiving the dead for decades when the walls were buily. By 1638, the National Covenant was signed inside the building, and Scottish religious and political history changed forever because of what happened in that day. The Covenanters who followed were imprisoned in a corner of the kirkyard in 1679 and the space has been accumulating weight for four hundred years.
On Saturday, 24 April 2027, a long table will run the full length of the nave at Greyfriars Kirk for a Highland feast in the spirit of Outlander.
This is the opening night of Story Feast Collective's 2027 Britain and Ireland season and the first event of the new Edinburgh chapter.
I have been looking for this venue for a long time. Story Feast began at St. John's Abbey in Minnesota, where we set a table for 180 guests in a Benedictine refectory built for communal meals. The abbey worked because the space itself carried the story. You did not need to explain the room because when you sat down at the long table, the historical space told you what kind of evening it was going to be.
Greyfriars Kirk does the same thing and it does it with a density of history that is hard to match anywhere else.
Walk through the ancient gate on Candlemakers’ Row and you pass the statue of Greyfriars Bobby, the Skye Terrier who, the story goes, guarded his master's grave for fourteen years until his own death in 1872.
Cross into Greyfriars Kirkyard and the gravestones are immediately legible to anyone who grew up reading Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling lived and wrote in Edinburgh during the early years of her novels. She pulled names directly from these stones: Tom Riddle, William McGonagall, a Potter or two. Over the wall, the turrets of George Heriot's School (founded 1628) are visible from the grounds. The school is widely cited as the visual inspiration for Hogwarts. Throughout the kirkyard, culinary herb gardens still grow in beds where rosemary, sage, mint, foxglove, and chives have thrived for centuries.
None of this is set dressing.
It is the actual substance of the place. And it is the same substance that the world of Outlander is built from: Reformation Scotland, Jacobite memory, stone and candlelight, the oral tradition of Highland feasting and storytelling. The kirk does not appear in the television series but the resonance is exact. The evening directly inspired by that world.
The feast itself is a five-course menu drawn from the wild larder of the Highlands, designed by an award-winning head chef whose career includes Michelin-starred kitchens, including The Fat Duck and Head Chef of Britain’s beloved Llwelyn’s. Ceramicists are creating serviceware exclusively for the evening, with vessels designed course by course, so that by the time the last plate is cleared the table reads as a moving exhibition. There is a thoughtful vegetarian dish for every course and a wide selection of nonalcoholic and alcoholic beverages are offered throughout the event and guests are sent home with a generous goody bag filled with high quality Scottish-made products. Highland music will play throughout the evening and the long table which runs the length of the nave, will be glowing with amber candlelight.
Before dinner, every guest has the option to join a themed small-group tour of the kirkyard led by the Greyfriars historian and team. Three tracks are offered: the Culinary Garden tour, the History of the Kirkyard tour, and the Harry Potter Inspirations tour, . Laird's Seat guests receive an additional private interior tour of the kirk itself.
This is not a costume party and it is not a film tie-in. It is a feast, a gathering, and a celebration. Guests are warmly invited to dress as the Highlands and the world of Outlander inspire them. But anything that makes you feel comfortable (and maybe a little festive) is most welcome.
Two ticket tiers are available.
The Highland Table (£210) includes the full evening: welcome cocktail, kirkyard tour, five courses with a complete vegetarian alternative at every course, a wide selection of beverages (alcoholic and nonalcoholic) throughout the evening, storytelling woven through the meal, and a curated goody bag including a piece of the bespoke ceramic serviceware. The Laird's Seat (£275, limited) adds a reserved seat at the head or centre of the long table, the private interior kirk tour, a champagne reception, a signed first edition of my book Elysian Kitchens, and an upgraded VIP goody bag with a Highland larder box of Scottish artisan provisions.
Tickets are on sale now at storyfeast.co/edinburgh.
Edinburgh is the first of four cities for 2027, with Dublin, Oxford, and London to follow. I am moving to Edinburgh in September and the Greyfriars team has been extraordinary from the first conversation. Their generosity with the space and their willingness to collaborate on every detail of the evening have made this possible and I am so looking forward to welcoming our lovely guests to the long table at the awe-inspiring and historically significant Greyfriars Kirk.
Limited seats are available at the long table and I expect tickets to sell out quite quickly. It is recommended to reserve your space early.
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