Brunch at Frogmary Green Farm

It’s been a while since I went anywhere new for brunch.

What with the whole global pandemic thing, and then a new puppy who quite frankly I find scary enough taking to an empty field, the opportunity hasn’t really arisen for me to enjoy a casual sweetcorn fritter or two somewhere new and exciting. In fact when I went back and checked, the last time I wrote about going out for brunch was when I had homemade baked beans at The Weir in February 2020, which felt rather poignant and sad.

A couple of weeks ago though, when Mako the puppy was going through a short, well behaved phase where I trusted her not to bark loudly in my face for half an hour or so, Belle and I decided to brave it and take her out for her first ever brunch. Frogmary Green Farm‘s cafe and restaurant, Farm and Field, said it was dog friendly and it was far enough from home that if we did end up causing a scene we could just never go back and no one would be any the wiser.

As it was, Mako was very well behaved, and so you now ARE the wiser.

We went while they were having their one of their sunflower weekends so that we could pretend we were going for a wholesome outdoor activity and not JUST pancakes, and although that has now finished I noticed that they have a pumpkin patch coming up soon, which would definitely be worth a visit. They also have their own small florist on site, Frogmary Flowers, which was very sweet. (Mako DID knock over a pot outside the flower shop but we stood it up again quickly and I think we got away with it.)

To maximise the chances of Mako sitting quietly under the table like one of those old dogs you see in pubs, we took her for a little walk before we went in to eat. There are plenty of fields around Frogmary Green Farm, so we were able to walk her basically from the restaurant rather than having to stop somewhere on the way.

Once she’d had her allocated 15 minutes, (5 minutes per month, twice a day, which feels like really nothing at all), we made our way into the restaurant to eat, pausing briefly to try and get Mako to pose for an Instagram worthy photo next to a pink bike.

She was less than keen.

As you can tell from the pink bicycle, Frogmary Green Farm is well set up for annoying types like me who see everything as an Instagram story. There were beautiful swathes of plants and flowers everywhere, gorgeous light fittings.. even the coffee cups lent themselves nicely to a photo.

Farm and Field does a breakfast menu from 9-11am and what they call a brunch menu from 11am-2.30pm but to be honest the breakfast is more my idea of brunch, and so we went at ten o’clock. No offence to fish tacos but they are not a brunch item in my mind.

You can see the whole menu here should you wish to decide for yourself but I dare you to eat a homemade burger with Jack Daniels sauce and call it brunch. I DARE YOU.

The breakfast menu had loads of choice, and I especially liked that there was plenty of scope for customisation. One whole section is a build your own brioche, where you can pick up to three fillings and your choice of sauce from a big long list. I wasn’t about to wait a year and a half for brunch in a new place just to have brioche bun though, no sir, I wanted a full on brunch experience the likes of which I’d never had before.

The first challenge was deciding whether to go sweet or savoury, but fortunately Belle and I are good enough friends that she doesn’t mind me rummaging about on her plate, so we decided to go with one of each. When I go somewhere new I always like to try something that feels like it might be unique to that place rather than just a bog standard breakfast, so we picked ‘early tater tots’ and ‘Biscoff French toast.’

Hash browns are always one of my favourite parts of a classic brunch – underrated in my opinion – but early tater tots played right into my hands by being essentially a huge bowl of tiny hash browns. Yum.

I say that, but actually it was tater tots with cheddar cheese, streaky bacon, harissa, salsa verde, pico de gallo and topped with a crispy fried egg and pea shoots. PEA SHOOTS! These weren’t on the menu but they were a joy to behold as they are one of my favourite things.

It was all delicious. Different to anything I’ve had before but very much still a brunch.

The Biscoff French toast was a thing of absolute beauty.

Have you ever seen such a glorious looking plateful? Biscoff coated cornbread, homemade Nutella, strawberry coulis, fresh strawberries and blueberries, biscoff crumble and vanilla ice cream.

Yes you read that right – homemade Nutella. The whole thing was delightful.

One thing I really liked was how well spaced out the tables were inside as this meant we could keep Mako to ourselves and she was never at risk of tripping anyone up. It also meant you felt very safe as you weren’t crowded in by other people. There was lots of seating outdoors too, but definitely book in advance as it was pretty nearly full when I booked a few days before our visit.

Honestly, it was such a treat going somewhere new and eating such beautiful food that it was totally worth the background anxiety of having an unpredictable puppy under my chair.

We will definitely be going back for pumpkin season.