From Market to Plate: Delaware Cafe’s Spontaneous Brunch

BY OWEN MORRIS

When young chef Joe West was handed the reins of the newly minted Delaware Cafe he had big plans. Grand plans. Not one of which concerned brunch. “That was more of a ten-minute brainstorm with the owners,” West said on our walk to the farmer’s market very early on a Saturday morning. “Every Saturday, we have a market three minutes away from our front door and we were talking about how to utilize it and I suggested brunch. The next Saturday we were doing it.”

The idea behind the spontaneous brunch is local, fresh ingredients assembled together in ways people aren’t used to seeing. West and his staff make sure to have plenty of different dishes each week and so far it’s working. “In terms of growth, it’s just getting bigger and bigger each week. Within three weeks of starting, we went from ten or so covers to forty.”

This past Saturday I tagged along with West to watch the entire process from the actual buying of the ingredients to the preparation to the plating.

Click on the photo for a slideshow.