Chef Matthew Brehm plates a course of handmade fresh stringozzi pasta with chard broccolini, Fresno chili pepper, fried shallots, and Parmesan “canna-butter.” STAFF PHOTO/CAROLYN BROWN
Chef Matthew Brehm takes photos of the dessert course, a “chocolate-canna lava cake,” inspired by a Joël Robuchon recipe, with wild berry sauce, candied walnuts, a “canna-cookie,” vanilla gelato, and mint dust, for his business Instagram.
A local chef is bringing a new meaning to the phrase “getting baked.”
Chef Matthew Brehm is the owner of Upscale Cannabis Wine Dinners, which provides catered brunches and dinners with weed-infused dishes. He operates out of western Massachusetts, but his radius extends throughout the state and northern Connecticut.
The evening of Friday, Oct. 18, Brehm was in a split-level house in a modest Springfield suburb for his second gig that week. As a soundtrack of pop and techno played nearby, he worked on the first course: handmade fresh stringozzi pasta with chard broccolini, Fresno chili pepper, fried shallots, and Parmesan “canna-butter,” paired with Foral Alvarinho wine. A group of guests waited downstairs at a table decorated with football-themed gel candles, fake leaves, and flowers.
His guests were a group of six friends, including a couple and a pair of siblings, who all declined to give their names or be photographed because most of them work in a nearby school. The group, also a trivia team, were veterans of Brehm’s cooking — some of them were part of the very first cannabis dinner he ever served. In fact, that evening was the third meal he’d cooked at that specific house.
The hostess had even kept the menus from the two previous meals. One, a dinner in December 2022, featured Korean barbeque cauliflower “canna-crepes,” homemade pasta with “lemon canna-mornay,” and almond crème brûlée with chocolate “canna-cake” and “canna-cookie crumb.” The other, a brunch in February of this year, featured “canna-lemon” scone muffins, “bourboned” mushroom and shallot bacon frittata, sumac-scented stuffed crepes, and “canna-banana-bread French toast.”
Prices vary depending on the length of the meal and the size of the group — a three-course meal costs $140 per person for two people or $110 per person for a group of six. Brehm also provides all the cutlery, plates, and napkins, and he takes care of the cleaning afterward, too. This is technically a side business for him — a busy month in this role involves five or six catered meals – his other job is as a part-time seasonal cook at a golf course, which he works to supplement his catering business.
While the group chatted downstairs, Curt, a longtime friend of Brehm’s who did not want to give his last name, was in the kitchen pouring six glasses of wine. Unlike Brehm, who studied at the now-shuttered Connecticut Culinary Institute in the early 2000s and has worked as an executive chef, Curt doesn’t have a culinary background (beyond “me and him worked in a pizza shop when we were teenagers”), but he and Brehm, he said, have “always been fascinated by food and/or drink.” Whenever Brehm needs an extra hand at a brunch or dinner, Curt steps in to help serve, clean, or whatever else helps the most.
