Diva Deborah sings for her supper

When Isobel partner Steve Hastings was asked to speak at the CIES food business forum’s recent event in London, he decided to bring a friend along for the Thames cruise and dinner afterwards. Most people’s friends are demure dinner guests, making small talk and hopefully staying soberish. Not Steve Hastings’ friend. She is Deborah Aloba, owner of both the largest agency T-shirt in the world and an extremely powerful soprano singing voice.

So not only were the assorted business types entertained with some top tunes, they were unable to hear the bloke next to them talking about how Q4 tortilla chip stocking levels (like for like, of course) were better than at any time since the first half of 2002. The Diary can think of a few other dinners that could use a Deborah Aloba.