THANK YOU
THANK YOU
A Father’s Day Afternoon Tea Event
This past Sunday June 19th, Dragonfly Delights Tearoom catered over 3 dozen beautiful guests at Black Wheat Brewing co Brandon and a few more for our gluten free offering on Saturday. My goal was missed by one reservation!
Our chosen theme for Father’s Day this year, A ploughman’s lunch. Well known in the UK as it is a popular pub menu item there.
I was determined to source as much local fare as possible for this event.
Ploughman’s Lunch
Our venue, the first craft brewery in Brandon, Black Wheat Brewing co. has a taproom at the corner of 10th and Louise. Although they do not serve food, you are most welcome to bring your own, or have something delivered while you sit, relax and enjoy the company of friends. They have beer on tap and you can purchase cans to take home . My favourite choice is “Life on the beach”. I do not drink beer but this one is like a sparkling fruit juice. Tyler was a great host introducing my guests to the great beers that the taproom has to offer.
Black Wheat Brewing co Brandon
Next our boards, I had hoped to have someone local make the boards. I know the process, I knew it might be costly, but I didn’t expect what I was quoted over and over again. In came Jen, a little message became an amazing offer to engrave store bought boards. Between her shifts at the hospital she made the 16 boards I had wanted for the event. She did both my logo and the taproom logo on the boards. She has a beautiful story that you can find at zoesophia.ca
Boards engraved by zoesophia.ca
Our ground pork for the mini pork pies, the salami and the ham was all from Tendercuts Meat and Deli found at 730 18th street. This is local sourced beef, pork and a local butcher. Their customer service was very patient, kind and courteous. You all said the meat was delicious.
Our charcuterie board for one, contained local New Bothwell Cheese, cheddar, chili pepper and mozzarella. These are cheese people, deeply rooted in history and tradition. They have been crafting premium, all-natural, artisanal cheeses since 1936 in the village of New Bothwell, Manitoba. Proud to provide Canadians with a wide variety of natural, premium cheeses. Their tradition is a tradition of quality. You can find them on social media, a web page or you can walk over to your grocery store and ask for New Bothwell from the specialty cheese section.
Made especially for us was a wheel of cheese from Loaf and Honey. A small Manitoban catering and cheese maker with a connection to locally sourced food. Dustin, the owner, is passionate about the quality of food, where it comes from and the people producing it.
He is producing an aged and hand-washed Monastic cheese that was passed down to him from Brother Alberic of the Annaye des Prairies Monestary in Holland MB. Dustin is currently operating out of the St. Norbert area.
When catering he loves getting to know his clients, creating custom menus and unique experiences. He is also producing small batch fresh whipped Ricottas in a variety of flavours. I believe these are available at Chez Angela. When we picked up our order we passed a box of these delicious ricottas to James.
I have wedges of the specially made for our event beer infused cheese here at the office. Call if you would like to purchase one for your own charcuterie experience at home.
Those little coins of butter included in the Ploughman’s Lunch were from Von Slicks Finishing Touch. Their ingenious packaging has won them awards. I chose garlic and red pepper butter flavours for our menu, but they offer lots more. You can find them on social media and a web page.
As always Lori from Hill Billy Hills Cookies brought us a themed cookie. Always too pretty to eat, but delicious. Hillbilly Hills Cookies, a Dunrea based business, offers unique and custom artful sugar cookies in many different styles. Owner Lori Bessant has been in business for over 5 years. She started out by making cookies for friends and family after her son was born in 2016. She found out shortly there after that she was so busy with cookies she was able to stay home and do this full time. Where does the business name come from, you ask? Lori’s husband’s nickname is hillbilly and Hillbilly Hills is the name of their farm.
From our Dragonfly Delights Tearoom kitchen you enjoyed a beer pretzel bun. One batch was made with Twilight while the other Batch contained Great Scott. That was the reason for the difference in colouring.
Our kitchen also created a mini pork pie with a traditional English recipe as the base.
That generous brownie came from our kitchen as well. Once again local Black Wheat beer in both the brownie and decadent chocolate ganache that topped it.
Loving local was so very much fun! I will continue to search for local made items for both the tearoom and gift shop.
I thank all of you who came to the taproom on Sunday, our first Ploughman’s Lunch. We will certainly do this again next Father’s Day and few more times in between.
Happy Father’s Day to a husband who puts up with my gypsy pirate princess attitude.
This event was created with my husband in mind, he loves visiting the taproom with friends at the end of the work week. I confess I was the one who revealed the surprise of his kids attending our first hour. I invited all 7 but didn’t tell him. He thought this was just another tea event and he was hauling boxes. I asked him at 11am when we began packing boxes “ so do you want to eat with the kids at noon or after it is all done at 4pm?” Oppps. then he knew that the kids were coming. My goof, but he was thrilled.
Surprise! Children and Grandchildren visiting for Father’s Day !
Happy Day !
Joanne
