Brunching out
Brunch may be a Western concept, but long, lazy weekend meals are a tradition across the globe. And while champagne brunches continue to steal the spotlight at high-end eateries, there's also been a surge of other finer trends in leisurely weekend meals, most notably the rise of ethnically themed brunches.
Weekend brunches in Hong Kong have long been synonymous with free-flowing bubbly and extravagant buffets. Even today, restaurants are still trying to outdo each other in this category. The Peninsula hotel's fine-dining establishment, Gaddi's, for example, recently launched its first-ever champagne brunch - 'Rose Sundays', featuring free-flowing Billecart-Salmon ros? champagne.
But when it comes to the new breed of regionally themed brunches, The Pawn is showing how it should be done. The weekend menu is a medley of British comfort food, from sloppy sausages and mash to golden-brown fish and chips, and from English crumpets with onion marmalade and black pudding to Sunday roasts. Since its launch last year, the weekend brunch has become popular among the expatriate crowd yearning for a taste of home.
Italian restaurant Domani also launched a weekend brunch earlier this year with tiers of antipasti lining the buffet table. Rhys Adams, project and marketing manager of El Grande Holdings, says the same effort and quality of ingredients used in the a la carte menus go into the weekend antipasti buffet.
Wan Chai tapas restaurant Uno Mas also jumped on the brunch bandwagon at the beginning of this year, opening another door for those wanting more than the regular menu of eggs and waffles. The weekend 'long brunch' is a five-course tasting menu highlighting traditional breakfast and lunch dishes from executive chef David Izquierdo Jover's native Spain. Menu highlights include omelettes in Catalan style, stuffed with serrano ham from Segovia and the tosta choricera, an open-faced sandwich with chorizo and fried eggs. And instead of champagne, brunch at Uno Mas comes with the option of free-flow cava.
More surprisingly, the past year has also seen the brunch tradition embraced by many non-Western restaurants. In February, Japanese restaurant Zuma launched a 'Sake Saturdays' brunch series, offering free-flowing sake with their signature izakaya bites. Other restaurants, such as Gilbert Yeung's Busy Suzie and Unkai at the Sheraton Hong Kong, have followed suit with their own Japanese brunch menus showcasing robatayaki and teppanyaki delicacies, respectively.
Those preferring the flavours of the subcontinent aren't being left out either: Indian restaurant Gaylord is now serving a weekend brunch. While Gaylord is predominately a Northern Indian restaurant, the brunch menu features a host of South Indian delicacies and popular snacks from the streets of Mumbai.
A major highlight on the menu is the dosa - a crispy thin crepe made popular as a brunch-time item by the tiffin rooms in southern India. At Gaylord, the cr?pes are made according to a traditional recipe with fermented rice flour and lentil batter, and are served with coconut chutney and a hot lentil sambar.
Whether it comes with limitless champagne or a buffet of ethnic delicacies, brunch is no longer a simple fusion of breakfast and lunch. It's an interesting meal in its own right - and something for all types of diners to hunger for.
