In case you missed it — and you really shouldn’t have — Anthony Yang was in town this weekend and hosted one of his cult-popular pop-up brunches in Mānoa.

Just about every food-obsessed person I know — including Honolulu Magazine food editor Martha Cheng, Frolic‘s foodies Melissa Chang and Grant Shindo, Henry Adaniya of Hank’s Haute Dogs, Hawaii Luxury Magazine‘s Sarah Honda, Good To Grill‘s Jason Kim, Roy’s Restaurant‘s Robbyn Shim — was there, ready to sample some of Yang’s creative brunch dishes.

Yang, who sharpened his culinary knives at Per Se and Michael Mina, started hosting pop-up brunch events — called Ante Meridian — for his coworkers and friends more than a year ago. Since then, they’ve become so popular, they take place twice a month and often sells out within hours of releasing the menu. (He’s even started a dinner pop-up called, of course, “Post Meridian.”) (Read more about him here.)

Yes, it was a bit pricey — almost $50 per ticket — but it would certainly cost most to fly to San Francisco to attend one of his events there.

Here are some snapshots from the morning:

The kitchen was bustling with local chefs — including chefs Chris Kajioka and Mark Noguchi — working with Yang on how to prepare and plate each dish.

The first of four courses of this prix fixe menu was this plate with dollops of yogurt from Naked Cow Dairy Farm and Creamery, coffee granola and lilikoi. Really tasty and not overly sweet.

The second dish was a brioche bread pudding — using bread crafted by Christopher Sy, who was also there — with corn, macadamia nut and squash compliments. I was slightly obsessed with the corn puree.

Next was the rice porridge with togarashi pork, homemade pickles and a poached egg. I loved the pickled cucumbers, radishes and kim chee cabbage. The pork, too, was a great balance of salty and smoky. This was my favorite dish, hands down.

Another highlight was the famed black truffle waffles, perfectly crispy and light with a hint of black truffle.

Yang thanked the sold-out crowd in attendance and gave everyone donut holes to take home. I gotta say, it was well worth the money — and missing a south swell, too.

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Congratulations to Amanda Corby and Pili Hawai‘i for another great event!