Hello, coffee lovers and valued patrons! We're excited to present the newest issue of our monthly newsletter, packed with thrilling updates, delightful news, and plenty of energizing excellence.
 

We have got A LOT to talk about, from upcoming events, new beers and new menu items.

We are also super excited to announce due to the growing popularity of evenings, we've decided to open up for Wednesday evenings also!
Wednesday-Saturday from 5pm.
Bookings are essential.

I (Gareth) have started a bit of a journal about my journey into running our own restaurant, my unintentional journey into coffee and how we ended up in Mangawhai Heads, to entering into the NZ Barista Champs 2024, I'll keep this at the bottom of each newsletter for those who wish to read it.

Music is a big part of what we enjoy here at Brewed, and we make it a point to keep our playlists fresh. I, along with the team, listen to music every day, and to ensure a dynamic musical experience.
It probably goes with saying that I love dub & reggae music, and
Fish & Bread are true connoisseurs of the Soundsystem culture, purely for the education and sharing their love and passion for Dub music, building a custom Soundsystem is no easy feat. We are lucky enough to have them play at Brewed on the 27th October, details below.

Soundsystem culture and dub reggae have deep roots in New Zealand, evolving from the country's rich history of reggae music, which has been a significant part of its musical landscape since the 1970s. It began to take shape in the 1980s, inspired by the Jamaican tradition where large, mobile speaker systems would be set up in public spaces for people to gather and enjoy music. New Zealand has produced several influential dub artists and bands, such as Salmonella Dub, Fat Freddy's Drop, and The Black Seeds, who have helped shape the sound and bring it to a global audience. These groups often incorporate elements of Māori and Pacific music, creating a distinctive New Zealand dub sound.
Check out the link below...

New menu/New drinks

We are so proud of our direction and certainly has been expressed by the amount of support that is slowly building for our evening menu.
We are always looking to how we can improve to give more to the people dining with us, so to align further, over the next few months, we'll be fine tuning our beer and wine lists to compliment and elevate the dining experience.

When: September 11th, Wednesday, from 5pm
Tickets: Link to event page, Free event

Join us for a night of homemade dumplings and live dub reggae! Enjoy mouth-watering, freshly made dumplings using local ingredients while local DJs and a top notch Soundsystem (The Funktion One) bring the vibrant rhythms of dub reggae to life!

Our chef has been working on some great flavours celebrating local produces from Ora's mushrooms to locally grown kingfish right here in Northland. It is all leading towards the Savour Northland event, running throughout October, more details below on this.

Why'd we choose Dumplings & Dub? Alliteration of course! but also, we love music, and want to create a simple vibe where friends can hang out and enjoy some tasty dumplings and feel some music.
 
What is Dub Music?
Wikipedia link

Dub is an electronic musical style that grew out of reggae in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is commonly considered a subgenre of reggae, though it has developed to extend beyond that style. Generally, dub consists of remixes of existing recordings created by significantly manipulating the original, usually through the removal of vocal parts, emphasis of the rhythm section (the stripped-down drum-and-bass track is sometimes referred to as a riddim), the application of studio effects such as echo and reverb, and the occasional dubbing of vocal or instrumental snippets from the original version or other works.

What are Dumplings?
Wikipedia link

Dumplings are a diverse category of dishes made from cooked dough, often filled with various ingredients like meat, vegetables, or cheese. The dough can be made from different starches, and the cooking methods range from boiling and steaming to occasionally frying or baking. The definition of a dumpling has evolved since the 17th century and varies across cultures, but it generally includes both plain and filled varieties, though some definitions exclude baked or fried items.
 

SAVOUR NORTHLAND
4th-28th October 2024
Think Wellington on a Plate, but for Northland, we have an exceptional talent of wine makers, produce growers and artisans right here in Northland, so its time to celebrate and tell the world!

Locally inspired dishes, special one-off events, culinary collaborations, and immersive workshops, all served up with our warm Northland manaakitanga (hospitality) and some of the best views in the world! It’s time to taste the treasures of Tai Tokerau. Join us for an unforgettable month of culinary goodness.
 

An abundance of mouth-watering magic!
 

Northland is home to delicious, fresh produce, amazing seafood, globally recognised wines, and award-winning restaurants, cafes and markets. Our sub-tropical paradise stretches from Mangawhai to Cape Reinga, the Tasman Sea to the Pacific Ocean! From hearty kai to unique dining experiences, get ready to Savour Northland with a huge range of foodie events this October!

At Brewed we're working with our chef and local wine makers to pair a couple of plates with wine and a cocktail to showcase the local ingredients available to us.

The event we'll be putting on Labour Weekend
We've teamed up with Fish & Bread Soundsystem.
~Dumplings & Dub~
Enjoy our hand-crafted dumplings made with fresh, local ingredients while enjoying the deep, rhythmic sounds of the Fish & Bread Soundsystem playing dub reggae.
 

Fish & Bread is a hand-made reggae sound system, built to celebrate the rich catalogue of reggae based music originating from Jamaica and Europe over the last 50 years.
 

Built in the tradition of European sound systems, their sound brings a unique vibe and character that can’t be achieved on a regular PA.

They select tunes with a message and a means to connect the dance together, and unite as one family. Expect a musical journey from the mystical to the militant and beyond.
 

Ticketed event $10, will be limited sales. Tickets available here.
Sunday, 27th October 2024

4pm-10pm

Have you got an upcoming event? Birthday? Work lunch? Xmas party? We can accommodate, whether its for a group of 10 or 100+, we can accommodate 40 inside, another 30 under cover, and over 80 outside in the courtyard, perfect on those beautiful sunny days.
If this is something you'd like to organise, get in touch with us at brewed.intentions@gmail.com.
Our full menu available to feed your guests, full bar menu, and if you want your favourite cocktail on for the night, we can sort it for you!

Chapter Three

After weeks of struggling through Saturday shifts without enough cups or milk to get through service, I finally had enough. I pulled the owners aside and asked them straight up, "Why should anyone choose your café over all the others along this Nobbys Beach promenade?" They just stared at me, completely blank. I told them, "If you can't confidently answer that question, you're in the wrong business." They fired me on the spot, but the truth can be hard to swallow. Less than six months later, that café was closed.
 

It's people like them—those who jump into the hospitality game without realizing the countless hours and effort it demands—that contribute to the sky-high failure rates in this industry. Despite their naive optimism, it takes more than just enjoying making coffee and chatting with locals to run a successful café. Luckily, I scored a full-time barista gig at a new restaurant that was set to open in two weeks.
 

This was where I truly began to grasp the importance of workflow efficiency. It was a bustling spot serving breakfast, lunch, and dinner, with the coffee machine tucked at the end of a U-shaped bar. As I got more comfortable in the space, I eventually became the bar manager, cranking out a new cocktail every two weeks and sometimes mixing up to 200 cocktails in a single night—with a bit of help from the glasswasher, of course.
 

After two years there, one day a young family came in, and we got chatting about where I was from, what I wanted to do, and if I’d travelled much. I told them I’d moved from New Zealand to Australia and was pretty content with my full-time job, living close to the stunning Burleigh Heads beach. The father leaned in and said, “I think it’s time you f**ked off, mate.” I was a bit taken aback until he smiled and added, “I’m talking about Europe, Asia, the Americas. The world is bigger than Australia and New Zealand, mate.”
 

During my lunch break, I raced to the Flight Centre to see how much a one-way ticket to London would set me back—London being the perfect springboard to Europe. The tickets were $1,700, and I had about $1,758 in my account. I took a moment to think it over and decided not to make such a rash decision. But later that night, I searched for more flights, found the same ticket for $860, and booked it on the spot.

I ended up bouncing around a few cafes in Bristol, and then in France, with coffee always close to my heart. I even had a head barista job lined up in Chamonix, France—the town sitting below Mont Blanc, one of Europe’s biggest mountains. During my 2 years based in Chamonix, I had a great time as a concierge driver, travelling to Italy and Switzerland, driving for some high calibre clients. In the off season, we volunteered at a surf school in Arrifana, Portugal, (South West coast) helping with guests, preparing meals, organising surfboards and wetsuits, and lounging around on the beach.

I really liked Portugal, for somewhere that is quite literally on the opposite side of the world, there were a lot of similarities to New Zealand. I applied for a French visa through a third-party company along with two Aussie mates. They got theirs approved, but mine was declined with a note saying I had to apply from my country of origin. This was just two days after New Zealand thrashed France in the Rugby World Cup. I’m not saying that some French are that petty, and that’s why my visa got denied, but apart from our personal details, the Aussies and I had filled out the forms identically. haha

We decided it was time to head back to New Zealand, but we stopped in Australia as the restaurant I worked at offered full time work for us, where we stayed for 1 year saving up for ski trip to Japan, where we spent 7 weeks. All too much to write here, but I'd actually written a blog while we were there, you can read it here, although the way worked was a bit backwards, follow the dates. Or check out a few of the pictures of the trip here. I will say though, I didn't have a bad coffee from a vending machine, not only that, but also hot lemon honey, hot creamed corn (sounds weirder that it was, it was delicious) Most of the things I miss most about Japan are actually the things I found the most strange when we first arrived there.

To be continued....