Premium ingredients and service guide Brazilian Court’s Boulud Breaks.
A sister restaurant to New York’s elite Daniel Boulud-owned Café Boulud, the Palm Beach, Florida, location at the Brazilian Court Hotel & Beach Club provides catering to the hotel’s small meeting groups. The inventive Boulud Break menus feature options in the classic culinary tradition engendered by its chef-proprietor.

“We host more upscale incentive and corporate groups with typically 10 to 30 participants,” says Catering Director Denise Mariani. “Every menu item in these breaks is house-made with premium ingredients.”

James Beard award-winner and Chef de Cuisine Zach Bell crafts the break menus, with a broad range of price points from $8 to $22 per person. Selections include handcrafted mini sandwiches such as housecured tuna with hard-boiled egg, tomato, Kalamata olives, onion, and Dijon vinaigrette on baguette; ham and sweet butter on baguette; turkey, havarti, avocado, sprouts, and basil mayonnaise on multigrain bread; grilled shrimp and avocado with lime-cilantro mayonnaise on brioche; and Middle Eastern roast beef wrap with cucumber yogurt dressing and olive salad.

Garden-fresh iced crudités feature buttermilk Maytag bleu cheese, harissa aioli, and creamy curry mayonnaise dips. The artisanal cheese board offerings are sourced from Murray’s cheese caves in New York, with grana padano, Maytag milk bleu, and Brie de Meaux as regular features—served with raisins, locally sourced honeycomb, and candied pecans.

Chef Pâtissier Matthew Petersen contributes menu options such as Le Voyage, with raspberry tiramisu, lemongrass panna cotta, coconut tapioca with white chocolate mousse, chocolate Szechuan tart, and tropical baba au rhum. Petersen’s French macarons are filled with buttercream and available by the dozen in orange, lavender, pistachio, apricot, and raspberry.

Boulud Breaks ice cream sandwiches use European- style ice creams and cookies; combinations include chocolate chip-pecan cookies with vanilla ice cream, peanut butter cookies with chocolate ice cream, and lemon sugar cookies with strawberry ice cream. All are priced at $50 per dozen.

“We are complete purists,” says Bell. “But if other hoteliers are put off by the intensity, they could offer this option more simply and affordably with minimal labor by slicing premium commercial ice cream and using cookies to build sandwiches.”

Barton Creek Resort offers affordable break enhancements.
Austin’s Barton Creek Resort & Spa caters to a primarily Texas-based meeting clientele with big appetites for quality, value, and flavor. Resort staff answers with attractively priced packages for morning and afternoon break service.

“Since a typical breakfast ranges from $20 to $30 [per person], we have found it beneficial to add value in the form of a continental breakfast enhancement to the morning coffee break,” says Director of F&B Kevin Newbolt.

Executive Chef Bill Bouza’s menus include the valuedriven Continental enhancement ($13), offering fruit and berries, assorted cereal and granola, house-made cinnamon-peach crumble coffee cake, and hot vanilla bean oatmeal. The Southwest Continental add-on ($16) features bacon, potato, and egg breakfast tacos with shredded cheese and private-label Barton Creek salsa; spinach quiche; marinated strawberries; and pecan sugar biscuits. The All-American enhancement ($16) offers smoked ham, egg, and housemade cheddar croissants; locally sourced sausage; buttermilk biscuits; black pepper pan gravy; and raspberry yogurt parfaits topped with granola. The most popular option is the Breakfast Taco Bar enhancement ($12) with freshly scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, potatoes, flour tortillas, house-made salsa and pico de gallo, and grated Monterey Jack cheese.

Like their morning counterparts, afternoon break enhancements are extended and replenished for approximately two hours. These menus feature the Build- Your-Own Trail Mix enhancement (minimum 25 guests, $14 each) in an interactive bar with Chex Mix, mini pretzels, goldfish, roasted sunflower kernels, sun-dried raisins, banana chips, gummy bears, corn nuts, dried fruit mix, yogurt pretzels, mixed nuts, sesame sticks, and chocolate-covered raisins and peanuts. The Low Carb upgrade ($12) offers house-made nutty trail mix, imported and domestic cheeses, baked artichoke and Parmesan cheese dip, and vegetable sticks. All breaks are served in a group area with custom granite-topped cabinetry where multi-colored artisan porcelain serveware provides abstract Southwestern panache.

A popular beverage option for breaks is original Dr. Pepper soda, bottled in nearby Dublin, Texas. Newbolt loves this memorable touch: “Both locals and out-oftowners are captivated by this retro, small-batch soft drink, made with 100 percent cane syrup and served in eight-ounce mini bottles. Our old-schoolers have requested packaged peanuts to put in their sodas for a real trip down memory lane. We hear oohs and ahs over this one!”

Nancy Fox covers food and beverage, travel, and lifestyle. A 20-year travel industry veteran based in Orlando, she has held positions with Walt Disney Attractions and AAA.

Share: