A Little Bit About a Lot of Things

 

One of my good gal pals, Leah, was having a birthday so I thought I would surprise her with a little party! I decided to have a brunch for her, and kept it pretty simple. No birthday would be complete without a birthday cake from Party Favors (in Brookline) of course. I opted for the yellow cake with vanilla frosting.

I adore our new dining room table from Saltwoods – perfect for entertaining a great group of ladies. I picked up these great Kendari placemats from Crate and Barrel and used my Pottery Barn “Great White” serving dishes and dinnerware.

I’m a big fan of helping yourself, so I set up some options on the buffet – this way you can sit and enjoy your company!

OMG! Bagels delivered some super fresh bagels for the event! Let me give you a little background on OMG! Bagels: The company is owned by Ana Maria and Jorge Vinha. Ana Maria used to live in the house down the street from me and a few years ago she moved back into the house she grew up in. My dad was chatting her up one day and he told her that I was a food blogger. To be honest, I had never heard of OMG! Bagels before but once I did some homework, I realized that they were everywhere. I was probably eating them all along and didn’t even know it. They are in Whole Foods, Bfresh, Flat Black, Espresso Love, Peet’s Coffee & Tea, and Verrill Farm to name just a few of their locations. You see, the company was born out of the need for a great wholesale bagel. Jorge and Ana Maria ran a commercial bakery and they just couldn’t find a wholesale bagel that actually tasted good. So Jorge spent 9 months perfecting the recipe for their New York style bagels. Now they come in 21 varieties. Check out their website to see where you can buy their bagels, or catch them at a Farmer’s Market during the season. Check out my previous post about OMG! Bagels here.

One of my favorite things to put together for a brunch event is a yogurt bar, I just think they are so fun! I used Stonyfield yogurt – plain and strawberry, and had some fresh fruit, granola and key lime curd on hand to mix in.

While I love cake, it’s important to have a variety of sweets. I picked up these lovely fruit tarts from Roche Bros. From left to right, sour cherry (Leah’s favorite flavor), peach and mixed berry.

In addition to the Party Favors cake, I went with some mini cupcakes in flavors like carrot cake, coconut, creamsicle, pink lemonade, german chocolate and Oreo (just to name a few). Another thing I love about Roche Bros. is that they have a biscotti case – I mixed and matched flavors like pistachio, lemon poppy, almond and chocolate chip.

The muffins are from Roche Bros. as well. Not as good as the old version, (they swear it’s the same recipe) they tell me that the only thing that is different is that they bake them in the paper instead of straight in the tins. Anyway: coffee cake, chocolate chip, double chocolate, corn, cranberry and blueberry.

I knew that I wanted to do a little party favor and with the guests being food bloggers, I thought that giving OMG! challahs was a perfect idea. The challahs are pretty darn delicious, I ate mine straight out of the bag, but I love using it to make French Toast as well – for some reason, this challah is just perfect for French Toast! I challenged the other ladies at the party to take their challahs home and make something with them, can’t wait to see what they made!

 

So cheers Leah to a wonderful birthday, this is going to be a great year! Thanks for your friendship and your thoughtfulness, you are truly one of a kind! Check out what Leah is doing on her blog: Leah’s Life: Pearls and Oysters.

 

Tags: bagels, entertaining, party, stonyfield