Hey everyone!

It’s the start of a brand new month again and we are fast approaching midyear 2015! But like the month of December, May is another month of endless spending for me. Not only is Mother’s Day around the corner, my Mom’s birthday happens to be in May too. And because my Mom enjoys being pampered, I usually don’t hold joint celebrations although both days are just a week apart.

Coincidentally, my boyfriend’s mother was also born in May – more than one year and a day before my Mom. Thus it makes remembering her birthday a cinch because she would celebrate hers on the following day of my Mom’s. However, due to our conflicting schedules, very seldom we would celebrate her birthday on the actual day. It’s often done in advance so as to avoid the Mother’s Day crowd and surcharges (and also because being Chinese, you know, belated celebrations are usually frowned upon). This year we had it at Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel because of a two-week long Mother’s Day buffet promotion going on at Café Brio’s.

For just S$48++ per person, you get to treat your beloved Mom to a pre-Mother’s Day hi-tea cum local barbeque buffet on 2 May and 9 May (basically, the two Saturdays prior to Mother’s Day), or a Mother’s Day lunch or dinner cum seafood barbeque buffet for S$68++ and S$78++ per person respectively on 3 May and 10 May.

Café Brio’s A Tribute to Mum

Thank Mum for her dedication to the family with a gratuitous buffet spread, featuring Osaka crab salad with Champagne gelee, jumbo king prawn with asparagus spear and mild spicy tomato cream sauce and seafood on ice. She’ll love the beef steak, slipper lobster, scallop on half shell, salmon fillet and stingray at the barbecue station. Sweeten her taste-buds with lovely peach melba roulade and mini chocolate glazed cupcakes.

All Mums will be presented with a heart-shaped cookie.

Here are some highlights of the hi-tea buffet last Saturday 🙂

Pastries and Desserts

I was instantly drawn to the colourful display of the cake tower upon entering the buffet. They’re so adorable, don’t you think? But for the longest time, these red velvet cupcakes were left untouched, probably no one wanted to ruin their nice arrangement. It was interrupted by me in the end, haha. The cupcake was moist and sweet. Would help myself to more servings if not for being weight-conscious.

Topped with golden chocolate pearls, these chocolate mousse were so alluring, I couldn’t resist taking one for myself. I only ate half of it (it was so hard stopping myself) because the thickness of the chocolate made me feel so sinful, oh my God. It was good nonetheless!

They were surprisingly soft as the scoop glided through the ice cream with ease. There are also waffle cones for you to scoop the ice cream onto them. I took 2 scoops – mango and vanilla 🙂

The egg tarts were a little tasteless in my opinion, and it would be better if the crusts were a little crispier and more flaky. It was a shame because I really love egg tarts and was looking forward to devouring most of them. But I really like how shiny the egg custard looked 🙂

Japanese Cuisine

I kinda shunned this section because it’s rice overload. I wished there were Sashimi! But most of the sushi were gone by the second hour of the buffet so I guess they are decent.

Local Delights

Don’t judge me – this is one of my favourite dishes that afternoon, so much so that I actually went back to the buffet table thrice for it. I’m really not much of a greens person but the bok choy was really delicious and soft.

I took a small spoonful of the rice and was actually yearning for more. It was really nice and well executed 🙂

Probably the most popular dish on the buffet table, the tiger prawns were gone in a flash shortly after we took our food, thanks to the convenience of shelled prawns. Seriously, I doubt they would be so sought after if they had their shells intact. They were scrumptious, fresh and slightly bigger than normal prawns though (which is a bonus for buffets). But replenishment was kinda slow so we actually had to wait a bit before we could go for a second serving.

The clams were generously huge and meaty for a buffet. Not to mention, they were pretty fresh too. The chilli gravy was divine. If you’re a fan of chilli crab, you would like this as much.

I suppose the steamed buns were meant to be dipped into the gravy of the chilli clams above. But they were a little too tough for my liking.

Dim Sum

You know that the buffet is extremely kids-friendly when they have a section dedicated to simple fried food like the above. Apart from crab meat sticks, there were also fried tapioca. Fried crab meat sticks are also my personal favourite which I often snacked on during my secondary school days so I was really excited to see them at the buffet.

Sandwiches

The mini soft buns tasted like BreadTalk’s Flosss lah with the sweet cream and generous layer of floss, just that instead of pork floss, it’s chicken. The bun itself was soft. Not bad! But I wouldn’t binge on bread at a buffet.

Salad

I attempted to cleanse my bowels with some beetroot salad. Was apprehensive at first because I had only tried beetroot in juice form but this was surprisingly good and fun to eat.

Barbecue

The barbecue corner can be found outdoors (near the section where the dim sum is) which isn’t very conspicuous if you’re not attentive enough.

Asian Desserts

It was a messy affair making my own Ice Kacang because I suck at using the shaved ice machine, but it was tons of fun! It was even more satisfying being able to decide how much of the syrup you want to drizzle over the mountain of ice (though mine was pretty much a hill.. or perhaps, a pile of gravel) because I totally went crazy with them. My creation was so sweet it could give me diabetes.

There was also a corner that served Laksa (prepared by a chef) and had several pots of western soup. I tried Creme of Mushroom but it was a tad tasteless (still decent and worth a try on the overall) so be sure to look out for those when you’re at the buffet!

Last but not least, if you’re going with your Mom, she will be given a heart-shaped cookie as mentioned in the blurb above!

There will still be another (last) session of Hi-Tea cum Local Barbecue Buffet this coming Saturday before the café reverts to their normal menu so be sure to make a reservation for that one. After all, it’s only S$48++ for a wide spread of food (even though it’s only hi-tea). It’s a steal if you ask me. And I’m sure your Mom would have a whale of a time there too!

Thanks for reading! 🙂

Café Brio’s @ Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel (beside Zouk)
392 Havelock Road
Singapore 169663
For reservations, call 6233 1100 or email dining.gcw@millenniumhotels.com
Website: A Tribute to Mum at Café Brio’s