Mothers Day Brunch Made Easy!

Do you want to make a unique Mother’s Day brunch for the special woman in your life? This year, avoid the restaurant, traffic and headaches and make it yourself at home with a memorable, simple and elegant brunch board. It requires minimal cooking, is an easy way to get your kids involved and will also impress your guest of honor. A brunch board, or charcuterie, allows you to prepare everything in advance and relax when it’s time to eat.

Your Mother’s Day charcuterie can consist of her favorite breads, fruits, cheeses, meats, eggs, yogurt, nuts, pickled items, olives, sweets, and whatever else strikes her palate! At Red Kitchen Foods, we use an eight-foot board we discovered at a discount store to arrange all our goodies. But if you don’t have a large board, you can always arrange serving platters and bowls on a table.

I like to fill my board with fresh fruits and vegetables that are in season. Some good choices for Mother’s Day are rainbow carrots, seedless cucumbers, tomatoes, radishes, blanched and chilled asparagus spears; Slices of pears, pineapple, peaches, apricots and berries.  The key is to layer ingredients and offer a selection of her favorite things. Bring out the beauty of the display with small arrangements made with flowers or herbs. A menu board or food labels created by the kids is meaningful and fun way to have them contribute!

Here’s a great starter list for your next charcuterie:

• Slices of hearty German-style brown bread, cut into triangles
• Baguette slices, and artisan country bread
• A semi-hard salty cheese, such as Piave Vecchio, Comté, Manchego, or Gruyere, cut into spears
• Cubes or thin slices of your favorite hard cheeses such as cheddar, colby, or swiss,
• A soft cheese for spreading: Cranberry goat cheese, Boursin, or even a quality cream cheese
• Proteins such as prosciutto, salami, turkey, rare roast beef, smoked salmon (Lox), ham
• Eggs that are either hard or soft-boiled
• Seasonal fruit and vegetables
• Pitted olives dressed up with her favorite dried herbs
• Li’l Gems candied Jalapenos and Pickled Green Tomatoes (made by Red Kitchen Foods-Smokin’ Texas Gourmet)
• 2 types of jam or jelly
• Local Honey
• Dried Fruit -dates, apricots, cherries, raisins, figs…
• Vanilla yogurt
• Pats of unsalted butter; or, smooth softened butter level to the brim of small bowls, with a sprinkle of course salt (Pink Himalayan, Smoked, Sea Salt, etc.)
• Flaky sea salt
• Freshly ground black pepper
• A “Sweet Table”- If time is tight, these quick options take your charcuterie over the top with tasty combination shortcuts from the local grocer:
  • Brownie bites split in half lengthwise, filled with nut butter, frosting, (whatever she loves) and dusted with powdered sugar
  • Her favorite chocolates or truffles
  • All store bakeries can supply ready to use-cake rounds or sheet cakes. Make it Fun and fresh with a “DIY” Trifle bar with two flavors of cubed cake, gourmet chocolate chips, chopped nuts, fresh berries, sliced bananas, whipped cream, Sauces (chocolate, caramel, strawberry), and seasonings such as Holiday Spice, and cocoa powder.

We hope you have a very Happy Mother’s Day!

Chef Peter Mollett is a contributing writer and owner/chef of Red Kitchen Foods–Smokin’ Texas Gourmet, 5970 Park Vista Circle, Suite 130, Keller, Texas. He can be reached at pmollett@smokintexasgourmet.com, Linked In https://twitter.com/smokintxgourmet  , Twitter https://twitter.com/smokintxgourmet  and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/redkitchenfoods/ .