‘More champagne?” asked the smartly attired host, Robin Smith. The 28-year-old company director, in kilt and black tie, walks around the elegant dining table towards a guest, Sal Moodie, an engineer from Glasgow, to top up her glass of fizz.

As he takes his seat, a plate of marinated scallops and crab is served and the eight friends around the table raise their champagne flutes toasting “a fine location” before tucking into their starter.

Nothing unusual . . . except that this candle-lit dinner is being held on the summit of a remote Scottish hill with views across Loch Lomond.

The highly imaginative and challenging alfresco dinner is part of a new outdoors adventure trend called extreme dining.

The idea is to host a formal dinner party in as unlikely or extreme a location as possible. The destination is kept a secret from guests until the last minute.

Earlier this summer, Smith and his team dined on a pontoon on a remote loch in the west of Scotland after walking for hours cross-country, then paddling a mile aboard inflatable swimming pool toys. Another dinner was held behind a large waterfall in the Campsie Fells near Glasgow, following a three-hour trek.

The rules are simple: all guests must be dressed in formal evening wear (walking boots allowed) for the entire adventure. As well as hiking across rough terrain to a mystery location, they must carry a dining table, chairs, white linen tablecloth and napkins, a silver serving dish, a candelabra and candles, cutlery, gravy dish and a four-course, precooked meal that is reheated over a fire or barbecue.

Drinks should include fine wines, sherry and port or brandy. A camera is also required to prove the dinner took place.

“One of the other rules of our challenge is absolutely no moaning,” says Smith. “We only invite like-minded people to be part of the concept and to attend our special dinners. Often there is a long walk to the dining location, over rough terrain and through rivers, and everyone has to carry their share of the equipment.”

In a similar trend during the late 1990s, the public’s imagination was caught by the extreme ironing craze. Over the years, madcap challenges have seen adventurers ironing in a canoe, while skiing, on top of large bronze statues, underwater and in war zones. There have been television documentaries, a DVD and a book about extreme ironing, as well as a world championship in 2002.

“People couldn’t believe what these guys got up to when it first came to the public’s attention,” says Gary Tompsett, a Scottish-based adventure race organiser. “Around that time I was trying to plan a stag weekend for one of my friends. I wanted to do something a bit different and I suddenly thought that instead of ironing we should go for extreme dining.”

Tompsett, 40, from Strathaven, south Lanarkshire, set about organising an extreme dining challenge on the Inner Hebridean isle of Coll.

“Everyone had to wear tuxedos or kilts and a black tie,” says Tompsett. “Then they also had to carry all the food — four full courses, I believe — a huge dining table, a candelabra and everything we needed for an evening of fine dining.

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