I can’t remember the Advent weekends being such a big deal in Australia, but in Germany it definitely is.

This past weekend marked the third advent and in celebration we had a big brunch out in the countryside at our friend’s place.

We stayed overnight and sat by the fire, setting up her Christmas tree. The next morning we got up early and started preparing all the food for the 21 guests who were coming for brunch at 11am.

At 9am we put a 4.5 Kilo cut of beef into the oven, to be slow cooked for a few hours. We were thinking about 3, but it turned out to almost need 5! We surrounded the cut with plenty of garlic and onions.

We prepared a fruit salad (banana, grape, pomegranate, orange and honey), some self-made Berner sausages (filled with cheese, wrapped in bacon strips), Italian sausages, pancake mix, chicken drumsticks, salad (cucumber, tomato, mozzarella in balsamic vinegar/olive oil dressing) and a number of desserts. Most of the food we made, but the guests also brought some dishes. A friend of ours brought Kölsch beer, a type of specialty beer that comes from Cologne and we had wines and juices as well.

It was a whole load of food and we ended up leaving around 3pm. After 4 hours of feeding we definitely did not need any dinner!

I’m not sure how people usually spend the third Advent but this is a tradition that I’d be glad to carry on.

Happy holidays and til next week!