Brunch & Co Event #22 - Brunch & Co with special guest chef Darren Farr!!

So what an awesome event we had here today at Brunch & Co!!  Our friend Darren Farr (fuzzychef@instagram), who's a professional executive chef, took over the stoves and whipped up an amazing feast of tasty & unique dishes. Quite frankly I'm not sure how we'll be able to top it other than by having Darren do another brunch event again in the future!

Louise & Darren

To decorate our table I had a go at making honeycomb which was fun, though a bit messy!

Homemade honeycomb

For starters, we indulged in Darren's home cured charcuterie consisting of slices of cured duck breast,  porchetta di testa (deboned pigs head rolled with herbs & cured), beef carpaccio with a yuzu dressing, pots of decadent pork rillettes, punchy cured slices of pumpkin served with a homemade labne, purple pickled eggs served with a Japanese spicy sprinkle & an amazing selection of artisan breads made by Joy from The Bread Project (...a fantastic bakery http://www.thebreadproject.com.sg/).  We had the pleasure of enjoying this first course with a lovely glass of champagne courtesy of Darren who supplied us with a magnum of Veuve Clicquot - thanks so much Darren!

Pickled eggs, labne & pickled pumpkin at the front & Joy's amazing bread

Darren's amazing beef tenderloin carpaccio

Delicious slices of Porchetta di Testa & pot of pork rillettes

Darren's own cured duck breast

For the main course we indulged in Darren's homemade corned beef, which melted in the mouth, along with buttery mash potatoes topped with grated fresh black truffles brought over from Australia - so special! Darren also made a delicious baked organic cauliflower dish and some stir fried purple kale, all served up with lovely bottles of Barton & Guestier wines - Chardonnay and a Chateuneuf du Pape Syrah & Grenache blend.

Darren's amazing corned beef with truffle mash potatoes

Amazing baked organic cauliflower

We then served up a lychee & coconut sorbet as a palate cleanser whilst being entertained by our special guest barista Pav, from a cafe called Sarnies (136 Telok Ayer St), who made coffees featuring their own specially roasted Ethiopian Conga coffee beans.

Pav working his barista magic!

After a tummy break & a seat swap, Brunch & Co was back in charge of the kitchen serving up our final course of a deconstructed lemon tart served with candied lemon zest & a limoncello granita.  This dessert was inspired by an episode of the TV program "MasterChef Australia" in which Dan Hong, a Sydney based celebrity chef, is put up against a contestant to make the best three course meal with the key ingredient being lemons.  His dessert for this challenge was a deconstructed lemon tart which had the judges swooning so much that watching them eat it made my mouth water - I was determined to have a go at recreating it!

Deconstructed lemon tart - Brunch & Co style!

A HUGE thank you to Darren for working so hard to prepare such an amazing brunch today - it was such a treat!!  Thanks also to Joy from the Bread Project for the amazing bread (each of our guests today got to go home with a beautiful Bread Project baguette!) & to Ben & Pav from Sarnies for the fantastic coffee & barista'ing!

Finally a heartfelt thanks to each of our wonderful guests today for being part of such a happy & delicious brunch - until next time!!

Lots of love,
Mark & Louise xx

Brunch & Co Event #21 - Hee Kong's Surprise Birthday Brunch!

We've been busy little bees at Brunch & Co lately with brunches scheduled over the last couple of weekends as well as a very special catering event for the lovely Kate from Kate Porter Yoga last Friday evening. Phew!!  The upcoming long weekend to celebrate both Hari Raya Puasa (celebration of the end of Ramadan fasting) as well as Singapore's National Day could not come at a better time!

This weekend's brunch was arranged by Sherry for a surprise birthday celebration for her husband Hee Kong - he certainly had a shock when he entered to find a bunch of his friends waiting for him!

Hee Kong arriving and about to be pounced on by Bear Hug David

As Hee Kong spent his childhood in Melbourne and enjoys Aussie cuisine, we decided to indulge in some of his favourite dishes (as advised by Sherry)!  We also decorated the table with a series of bespoke "Melbourne Landmark" napkins & lamington cookies.

To start, we served 63 degree soft boiled eggs with croque monsieur toast soldiers - these crispy little fingers were filled with parma ham and slathered with melted butter & dijon mustard and sprinkled with shredded gruyere cheese before getting a toasting in the oven - totally delish!

We then moved onto the main course of our take on the quintessential Aussie Meat Pie.  We took our inspiration from the recipe for a "Humble Beef Pie" from the Bourke St Bakery cookbook - absolutely delicious with big chunks of tender beef covered in a tomatoey gravy....

Alongside the pies, we served up a big dish of buttery mash potatoes seasoned with truffle salt and some French Beans drizzled with olive oil & a sprinkle of lemon zest.

The finale was Heston Blumenthal's pot plant Tiramisu topped with homemade chocolate "soil".

We had such a fun time preparing & serving up today's meal to such a lovely group of brunchers - we hope you all had a fun & yummy time!

Happy Birthday Hee Kong!

Cheers,
Louise & Mark xx

Brunch & Co Event #20 - Christmas in July Brunch!

A very quick post to share a few photos of the brunch we did today for Su-Lin and her friends.

Upon Su-Lin's request, we prepared a menu inspired by the theme "Christmas in July" - a novel idea for all-year-round 32 degrees Singapore (!!) but with a little imagination (and full throttle aircon), I think we did pretty well turning our little underground restaurant into a winter wonderland - complete with giant snowballs hanging from the ceiling!  We also decorated the table with homemade white chocolate and candy cane cookies.

We kicked off the festivities with warm mulled wine and a lemon & mint iced tea.  Then served a creamy chai tea infused rice pudding topped with poached pears, figs & cherries.

Following on, we served a herb stuffed roasted chicken breast, cranberry jelly, roast potatoes, carrots & an orange, hazelnut snow pea & French bean salad.

After a short break we served up a green apple & calvado sorbet....

And to finish everybody off we served up individual pots of Baked Alaska - Christmas style!  Valrhona chocolate fudge cake topped with homemade fruit mince pie ice cream and covered in a toasted cinnamon meringue.

We hope you all had a fun & yummy day!  We're now off to prepare for a busy week ahead - an exciting catering job on Friday and another private brunch on Sunday - woohoo!

Happy Brunching to one and all!

Cheers,
Louise & Mark

Brunch & Co Event #19 - Australia Brunch!

I have not previously thought of myself as a sucker for punishment but the description did cross my mind a few times last week as we prepared for back to back brunch sessions scheduled for this weekend just past. What was I thinking when I came up with this crazy idea??!! We've only previously done one brunch per month and here I was agreeing to host two consecutive brunches!!??  

Well, thinking back, my reasoning at the time was that I knew we would have just returned from an amazing trip to the brunch meccas of Melbourne & Sydney and that I would be bursting to share everything that we had experienced with our lovely guests! We also had a huge number of requests for seats when we launched this brunch event a month or so ago (sorry to those that missed out, despite our efforts) so, not wanting to disappoint our excited guests we (I) decided to hold two brunches - one on Saturday & another session on Sunday. Well... it sounded reasonable at the time!

Thankfully both events went wonderfully well - lovely guests, happy tummies filled with Aussie inspired recipes & specially purchased & hand carried back ingredients, lots of catching up chatter & laughter with existing friends & blossomings of new friendships forming - everything that makes us happy doing what we do at Brunch & Co - YAY!

For starters, we served up Mark's all time favourite breakfast dish - a decadently creamy vanilla bean infused rice pudding with a rhubarb compote à la Matt Wilkinson from Pope Joan cafe in Melbourne.  

Our main course was inspired by a dish I had for brunch last Saturday at a great cafe in Sydney called "The Grounds of Alexandria".  This place is amazing - not just a cafe, but perfectly described elsewhere as "a sprawling paradise for people who love brunch". On the day we went, there was a small farmers market in full swing as well as an animal petting enclosure for the kiddies (including a little piggy called "Kevin Bacon"), a DJ pumping out cool music and a huge foodstore selling all sorts of amazing ingredients & tasty treats (including oozy grilled raclette cheese sandwiches...YUM!). After a one hour wait for our table, the dish I chose (after seeing someone else's order) was called the "Well-Being Breakfast" which I absolutely loved.  Hopefully our Brunch & Co recreation did the original dish proud!  It consisted of slices of smoked salmon, gribiche free range Aussie eggs (hand carried back from Sydney's Eveleigh farmers market - plus a few wedges of New Zealand free range eggs for comparison), a fennel, bean & grilled zucchini salad, homemade pickled beetroot & a dill Crème fraîche.  A dish full of complimenting flavours to tantalize the taste buds!

We served this with delicious toasty bread slathered with another Aussie treat - Pepe Saya handcrafted butter which we picked up at a farmers market in Sydney - this stuff is how butter should really taste!

After a nice tummy break we served up our palate cleanser - a pink grapefruit sorbet along with cute souvenir spoons I picked up at Camberwell Market (the best carboot/flea market in the world!!).

For the finale of our Australia brunch, we made a fig & almond tart and served it with a homemade salted caramel ice cream - this turned out to be a big favourite especially for the Sunday group!

So this weekend we also launched our fun little "Brunch & Co Corner Store" - showcasing a few of our favourite foodie ingredients brought back from Australia and a small selection of Brunch & Co made items to share with our lovely guests.  It was fun!

Thanks again to my amazing hubby Mark for all his support both in and out of the kitchen, and, thanks to our amazingly wonderful guests who have all embraced the art of proper brunching to their hearts.

Until next time!

Louise & Mark xx

Brunch & Co on Wheels - TWO CORPORATE CATERING EVENTS & A SPECIAL BIRTHDAY CAKE!!

June started with a bang for Brunch & Co as we helped to cater food for two corporate events for a very schmick lighting company on Club Street.

It was great fun developing the menu for the buffet dinner & lunch - we wanted to create spreads that were not only delicious but also visually beautiful and different to standard catering fare available here in Singapore.  We also needed food that was easy to eat whilst watching presentations and also food that could be happily served at room temperature.  We hope we hit the mark!

For the dinner, we served the following:

- Roasted Pumpkin, baby potatoes, chickpeas, baby spinach leaves with a Middle Eastern dressing
- French beans & sugar snaps tossed in Extra Virgin Olive Oil & Orange
- Gorgeous Pistachio Dukkah roasted chicken thighs sprinkled with pomegranate
- Cherry Tomato bruschetta, using homemade walnut bread
- Individual Very Boozy Sherry Trifles

For our lunch event, we served the following:

- Asian inspired soba noodle, shredded chicken & crunchy vegetable salad served in individual noodle boxes
- Sesame spiced roasted chicken balls
- Dessert shots - Lemon curd & ginger crumb shots & White Chocolate pudding shots with rhubarb compote
- Melting moment cookies with a raspberry butter cream frosting

We also made a few extra special desserts for them to try for future events!

- Heston Blumenthal's tiramisu plant pots (with asparagus sprigs shooting out of the chocolate soil)
- Green tea tiramisu
- Strawberry & Pomegranate Fool

We also had a special birthday cake order for our friend Chris' pal Andrew (a.k.a. Fangio) - both keen cyclists! We made a Lemon & Almond cake drizzled with lemon syrup and topped with a lemon & custard butter cream frosting - yummy!

Let Brunch & Co cater your special event and/or bake a homemade bespoke cake for your next happy occasion!  For more information contact Louise at brunchandcompany@gmail.com.

Until then, happy brunching!

Louise