Christmas is made perfect when you are sitting by a real open fire with the family and when your relaxing on your own after the festivities finishing off the mulled wine, but can you tell the difference between gas and real burning coal?

My friends can’t, we enjoyed a relaxing drink by the river yesterday in a kind of romantic old pub with big woodern fireplaces and cast iron tiled inserts with gas fires inside. I popped off to the toilet and four friends (and one husband) started up the conversation of how wonderful a real fire is and a gas fire is simply no comparison and could never look as good as these fires.  I then pointed out the gas pipe at the side!