I dont know who invented brunch, but he surely must have been a great man (or woman). Brunch is a mixture of late breakfast and early lunch, which is usually eaten during the late morning or early afternoon. When I googled 'brunch' I learned that it was invented in England in the late 19th and later became popular in the US.
I feel that brunch is such a great invention, that it will always be popular (at least in my world). What I like most about brunch, is that you can have that glass of champagne already in morning hours and enjoy some salty, lunch-like bites while chatting to friends and just feeling fab.
Well.. before I this happens to me, I still have to do a bit of work. Namely organize this brunch. We have recently invited friends over to have brunch at our place – and suddenly I found myself pinteresting (is there such a verb?) away about everything related to 'brunch'. Then I thought – hey, why dont I share these inspiring impressions and reflections with someone? And this is what I do now.
I will cover the most important elements to consider when organizing a brunch for friends at your place. Let us start with the invitation.
Invitation
It all starts with the invitation. Once you know who you want to invite, you need to tell them. You can do this orally over the phone, create a whatsapp group or tell them in person. What I did however, was creating a nice-looking PDF file, which contains all required information. Make sure to include the following:
Who is being invited?
What is the occasion?
Date and time
Location address
By when to rsvp
What to bring along, if anything
Your conctact details
The invitation should go out at the latest two weeks before the indicated date. Three weeks are better. I then created a facebook event and uploaded this PDF there. I very much like the feature with facebook events that invitees can right away say whether they are attending the party or not. See some great examples of brunch invitations below.
Food
So once you invited your guests, it is time to start thinking about what you are going to serve them. As we outlined in the beginning of this post, brunch is a mix of breakfast and lunch. This means that it would be good to offer both hot and cold, salty and sweet dishes. When I was researching 'food ideas for brunch' I came along quite a few good ideas, that I thought I need to share this. Especially I liked the idea of having 'a bar' of something, e.g. 'the waffle bar', or the 'pancakes bar' or the 'champagne bar'. Your guests can help themselves without a hurry and when nicely decorated such a bar adds a great deal to a cozy atmosphere.
Here is a list of some dishes that can be served during a brunch:
Stuffed croissants
Mini-pancakes (you can make everything in such a mini-format, it will look great and avoid a lot of sauce dripping)
Waffles with strawberries and hot chocolate
Scrambled eggs
Omlette
Bacon and meat platter
Bagels
Yoghurt with cereals, muesli and fresh berries
Muffins
Quiche
Fish platter
Cheese platter
Tartines
You see why I adore having brunch? :) There is just so much delicious food you can have at the same time, ideally all is mini-sized so that you dont feel guilty when longing for that second pancake... mini, of course.
Drinks
When it comes to what drinks to serve during brunch, I recommend champagne. You can serve it pure, or add a fresh touch by mixing it with sirups (strawberry and raspberry work well here). Make sure to offer non-alcoholic drinks, because some of your guests may arrive by car and you dont want to disappoint them by not being able to offer something to drink. Choose water and juices. Orange juice works well, as well as some more exotic ones. You will definitely earn many bonus-points among your guests if you offer freshly squeezed juice. But certainly no one will expect to receive this kind of luxury treat when the brunch is taking place at someone's home. Check out this link for some great brunch beverage recipes.
Decoration
Much of the brunch atmosphere comes down to the decoration and how the hosts welcome their guests. Whatever happens, make your guests feel at home! When they are relaxed and happy, they are a lot less likely to notice that you forgot to put salt into the omlette or that the champagne could be colder. When you plan food and drinks for your bunch, you should also give the decoration some thinking: Will it take place in only one room? Will everybody be sitting along a table or will everybody be standing? What style do you want your brunch to be? Lady-like elegant or rather rusty country-style?
Depending on this you can twist your decoration and create a great atmosphere with just a few touches. See some examples below that inspired me.
I hope these thoughts, images and ideas will help you in organizing your next brunch. Dont forget to invite your guests in time, be as charming as you can be and stock up on champagne - because there can never be too many bottles of this fabulous drink in your fridge!