Cape Town by Mouth

When Cam’s best friend, Donald, flew down from Joburg for the weekend I knew we would be in for some great wine routing and a long lunch. Don is a big wine aficionado and has been everywhere so we had to come up with something less usual. I am a big fan of minerally and elegant cold climate wines so we decided to head out to the Hemel en Aarde Valley. Just before we got there we we  made a left onto a dirt road that lead us onto the Van der Stel pass. We are always looking for quirky little finds where passion runs the show. Not least because our dream is to have a spot like that ourselves. The Van der Stel Pass has passionate quirkiness galore paired with beautiful scenery. Moreover it is just an hour away from Cape Town.

Kolkol restaurant in a Log Cabin

The highlight of our visit was Kolkol. We almost didn’t go as we asked around for restaurant recommendations. Don’t get me wrong everyone did recommend it. It is just that they said that the food is Mediterranean and that they have a long list with all sorts of options. We were thinking pizzas, burgers, thai… not so much.

Boy were we glad we went!

View from the deck at Kolkol

Kolkol is a log cabin high on the slope of the mountain with sweeping views across green hills and valleys. It was started as a couple of  mountain lodges for tourists and the restaurant opened about six months ago. It is one of those spots that just oozes a certain happiness and passion. You get greeted at the door by husband and wife team, Karen and Rudi Oosthuyse, and we also got to chat to their chef, Edmund Viljoen, who trained under Heston Blumenthal (!).

Sadly we had quite a light lunch as we had had a heavy night. We had a platter which included charcuterie, cheese, stunning little salad leaves and perfectly cooked pork belly. Kolkol tries to source everything locally. They apologized for the cheese coming from a big supplier (Fairview). Apparently there is someone who is just getting into cheese production in Bot River that they hope to be using soon. I had Kabeljou which was cooked to absolute perfection. Moist but with a great grill flavour. Slightly unusually it came with a passionfruit sauce. I was tempted to lick my plate.  Other options on the day we visited included a chicken breast stuffed with kalahari truffles and thinly sliced duck with avocado and pomegranate dressing. The menu changes regularly and it is nice and focused. In line with the local sourcing policy, Kolkol serves wines from the small Bot River wineries. We had a lovely oaked chenin blanc from Beaumont.

Absolute gem of a spot. Will be going back soon for more. Maybe even a log cabin visit?

e-mail: info@kolkol.co.za

tel: 082 6545090

http://www.kolkol.co.za/

Sublime fish at Kolkol

I have a long list of winelands restaurants that I want to visit that never seems to get shorter so I was very pleased when our old neighbor suggested a gourmet lunch at Pierneef. Expectations were high. Chris Erasmus used to be the Chef of Ginja, a downtown eatery, where we had some memorable meals a few years ago.

Pierneef is located on the La Motte wine estate in Franschhoek in a beautiful space with high ceilings decorated with crockery chandeliers (see pic) and sketches from Pierneef the painter. The menu is creative and interesting, featuring rare bits of offal and old cape recipes. Most dishes on the menu are on the heavy side but hey it is winter after all (20 degrees celsius and sunny…).

As a contrast to the other options, our shiraz-cured trout was a lovely light dish although I am not sure I tasted much shiraz. The other starters were less thoroughly enjoyed and came in huge portions. I think a starter portion of the barley soup would have fed a family.

We

We were all a bit disappointed with our mains. The shiraz did not seem to add much to the  shiraz chips served with the steak. Zoutribbetjes were a bit dry and very very salty- I guess that is the point based on the name (saltribs in English).  I went for the vegetarian option of mushroom snysel. The flavour was nice, but it was a huge bowl of sauteed mushrooms topped with a deep fried egg and slightly chewy stale “snysels”. The waiter had no idea what they were but according to the fineprint in the menu, snysels are a type of pasta made using milk and eggs according to an old Cape recipe. Suffice to say that some old recipes have been forgotten for a reason.

Chocolate symphony at Pierneef

Out of our three course meal, the desserts were the highlight. The symphony of chocolate was delicious but it would have been enough for the whole table. Same applied to the rooibos bread and butter pudding.

Service was patchy and quite impersonal. I don’t need someone to be my long lost friend but I do appreciate a waiter who has opinions about the dishes and the wines when asked.  Also when half the food is left on a plate, it would make sense to ask if anything was wrong.

tel: +27 (0)21 876 8800
R45 Main Road, Franschhoek
e-mail: pierneef@la-motte.co.za
www.la-motte.com

June is the time for oranges in Cape Town. I have been missing them for a couple of months already and thought that it was time to celebrate their yumminess. So I came up with a menu that had orange in just about every dish. Butternut and orange soup for starters, pork roast with balsamic and orange roasted beetroot and finally a chocolate orange marquise for dessert. I have to say it was the best chocolate cake I have ever made. Highly decadent.

Chocolate and orange marquise

Serves 6-8

Base:
1 egg white
50g icing sugar
50 g flaked almonds
80 g crushed pistachios

Cake:
1.5 dl sugar
1 dl fresh orange juice
220 g dark chocolate chopped into small pieces
100g unsalted butter, cubed
3eggs
1 orange zest, grated
2 tbsp flour
icing sugar and orange zest to decorate

Instructions:
Start with the cake. Preheat the 180 degrees celsius. Line a small cake pan or other round ovenproof dish with baking paper. The dish needs to fit into a roasting pan.   Place half of the sugar in a saucepan, add orange juice and stir over gentle heat until sugar has dissolved completely. Remove from heat and stir in chocolate and butter.   Whisk eggs and other half of the sugar in a large bowl until very thick, add the orange zest. Fold the chocolate mixture into the egg mixture carefully. Sift the flour and fold in. Scrape the mixture into the  cake pan.   Place in a roasting pan, transfer to the oven and pour hot water into the roasting pan to about halfway up the sides of the cake pan. Bake for about 1 hour or until the cake is firm to the touch. Remove the cake from the water bath and let it cool before you take it out of the pan.   Make the base as the cake cools down. Line a baking tray with parchment and draw a circle the size of the pan you baked the cake in. Combine all the ingredients for the base gently and lay them out over the circle you drew in a thin layer. Place the tray in the oven and bake for about 20 minutes until it is golden brown. let it cool and transfer it to your serving dish.

Turn the cake out on the base quickly and carefully. You only get one shot as it is tricky to move. Dust with icing sugar and decorate with orange zest. Serve with custard.

*If you want you can make candied orange zest as a decoration. Cut zest of one orange into thin strips and boil it in 2 dl of water and 0.5 dl of sugar until soft. Dry on kitchen roll.

We were planning to go to the Old Mutual wine tasting on Thursday, but got to the parking lot and started talking about food. I said I’m hungry and we established that  what we actually want is food not wine. So we made a u-turn and went to Bizerca instead for a treat. I mean the dinner was practically half the price as we saved money on the tasting tickets, right?

Bizerca is a spot I have been wanting to visit for ages. A lot of people ask me for restaurant recommendations in Cape Town itself and I am often at a loss and end up guiding them to tasty spots further afield. Bizerca is run by a South African- French couple who moved here via Sydney. It is located in a commercial part of the foreshore in a space that must have required a fair bit of imagination to turn into a restaurant. It looks like one of the walls has a garage-type door so I can only imagine what used to be there before.

The food was actually a lot less nuts than the name Bizerca would suggest. Probably also because we didn’t have oysters with gooseberries.  We had an ossobucco ravioli and celeriac remoulade with trout for starters. Both were excellent. The Karoo lamb stew we had as main was perfect as well. The only fault in the food was our overly salty gemsbok with turnip and pear.  Desserts were an absolute highlight. The chocolate fondant came with three of my favorite things on one single plate: choc fondant, raspberry sorbet and a little pot au creme (creme brulee without the brulee bit). Happy days. The croissant and butter pudding with quince ice cream was marvelous as well. Contrary to normal French restaurants Bizerca does cater to vegetarians as well.  There were a couple of options in the starter menu: beetroot and blue cheese tart and onion soup. The vegetarian option for mains is butternut gnocchi.

The service was attentive but maybe needed some training in the wine department. When I asked about a specific white wine the response I got was that it is good and no one ever complains about it. Hmm. Bizerca has a wonderfully vast selection of  wine (which is housed in its own special room) as well as a great selection of wines by the glass so I can imagine that it takes time to learn but still.

Bizerca was buzzing with people the night we visited and the owner was doing her rounds to make sure everyone felt welcome. Yet I still feel like the space could do with some more warmth, maybe candles? Maybe just me. I’m all for quirky design and modern interiors but it is somehow not quite right. The food in any case is spectacular and next time I would go for something more adventurous to test it out properly.

Jetty Street, Foreshore, Cape Town
+27 (0)21 418 0001

http://www.bizerca.com

Some of my fondest childhood memories relate to foraging for girolles with my parents at our summerhouse in Finland. Finns are spoiled when it comes to mushrooms – from May to the first frosts in November there is always something exciting in the forest. In fact Finnish forests are so bountiful with porcini that Italians fly in to pick them.

Mushroom identification at Tokai forest

When I discovered that slowfood organizes an annual mushroom foraging event in Cape Town, I got hugely excited about learning about local varieties.  It was a tough winter’s day of about 25 C when we met our fellow basket-bearing foragers at the picturesque Tokai forest. We set off in small groups to pick whatever we could find for a little identification session an hour later with a mushroom expert. Being in South Africa, our foraging activities were overseen by a troop of baboons keen to share our loot.

Lots of pretty mushrooms

I was surprised to see 20ish different types of mushrooms appear from the baskets.  To Cam’s delight one of the mushrooms was peppery- a bit like chilli. Most of the mushrooms have exciting names like blusher and deceiver and you can think of great fairy tales to go with them. There is also the death cap, which apparently lives up to its name.  Based on a quick google search it is the world’s most dangerous mushroom- glad our team didn’t pick any.  These mushrooms were brought to South Africa by settlers who transported whole trees (roots intact) from Europe. The mushrooms came along as they live in symbiosis with the trees. I was slightly disappointed that we weren’t picking native varieties. Apparently there are some edible ones but they taste like soap. So maybe not such a loss. We took home a basket of pine rings which we sauteed in butter and garlic.

Pine rings

This event was organized by Slowfood which is an international organization that promotes biodiversity, taste education and artisan producers. Slowfood organizes all sorts of fun foraging events and outings to different producers. Last week we went to a charcuterie making class.  Click here to find out more about Slowfood.

Laying out our finds

Cam and the chili mushroom

Baboon friend keeping an eye on our foraging

Twin sisters, Jessie and Jamie, opened Skinny Legs & All to fulfill a dream of owning a cafe. A gallery in its previous life, the space still retains a light airy feel as well as some modern sculptures and paintings. One of them is a rather dominating portrait of a what could be a long lost aunt keeping an eye on the cooking (apparently she is not related). The clientele is in line with the art gallery past- fashion editors and the like. People who can wear leopard prints and get away with it.

Skinny Legs& All

Skinny legs & all has a certain thoughtfulness that provides a warm contrast to the modern nature of the space. The custom made crockery is rustic and my espresso was served from a lovely antique cup with a heart shaped shortbread biscuit. My chicken and avocado sandwich, served on sourdough bread, was moist and delicately flavoured. Apart from a selection of sandwiches and salads, skinny legs serves mains like franschhoek trout and rosemary chicken. The drinks menu offers some unusual options: lime, grapefruit and ginger juice (which was yum), a green shake and a raw chocolate shake.

To top everything off, my food was served with an enthusiastic smile from someone who is clearly enjoying what they do. Happy days.

70 Loop St Cape Town

Tel: 021 423 5403

www.skinnylegsandall.co.za

enquiries@skinnylegsandall.co.za

Tasty avo and chicken sandwich at Skinny Legs and all

This has got to be one of my all time favorite Ottolenghi recipes (recipe from first Ottolenghi cookbook). Take something as well uninspiring as broccoli and spice it up with chilli and lemons. Mmm. I bet you can make anyone like broccoli if you feed them this. It is also very easy to make and spices up any wintery meat, potato and veg-type meal.

Ingredients:

2 heads of broccoli, separated into florets

115ml olive oil

4 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

2 mild red chillies thinly sliced

sea salt and black pepper

toasted flaked almonds or thin slices of lemon with skin

Fill a large saucepan with water and bring it to boil. Throw in the broccoli and blanch for two minutes only. Don’t over cook it. Using a large slotted spoon transfer the broccoli to a bowl full of ice water. Drain in a colander and allow to dry completely. It is important that the broccoli isn’t wet at all. In a mixing bowl, toss the broccoli with 45ml of the olive oil and a generous amount of salt and pepper.

Place a ridged griddle pan over high heat and leave it there for five minutes so that it becomes very hot. Grill the broccoli in several batches. The florets must not be cramped.

While grilling the broccoli, place the rest of the oil in a small saucepan with the garlic and chillies. cook them over medium heat until the garlic begins to brown. Pour the oil, garlic and chilli over the broccoli and adjust the seasoning.

Serve warm or at room temperature. Garnish with almonds of lemons.

Woohoo. I have been writing this blog since January and this is my 100th blog post. I thought it would be fun to do something special to celebrate so here is a list of my favorite spots (not in order). I am going to make a page of this blogpost and update it as I discover new amazing spots.

In Cape Town and surrounds:

Breakfast: Miss K - poached eggs with chilli on beautiful bread.

Seafood with a view: Live Bait - casual seafood restaurant right on the sea at Kalk Bay harbour. Short focused menu. Amazing paprika calamari.

Coffee and pastry: Caffe Milano- amazing bread and pastries. Best pain au chocolat outside of Paris. We are addicted to their 100% rye bread.

Casual dinner: Societi Bistro- great casual local vibe in beautiful courtyard in down town Cape Town. Great food and the friendliest service. Long list of wines by the glass.

Fine dining treat: Foodbarn- perfect mix of casual atmosphere and fine dining. One of SA’s Top chefs in Noordhoek.

Best pizza: Massimo’s- beautiful wood fired pizza with a warm welcome.

Biscuit Mill Market- a must for any foodie visitor in Cape Town. Beautiful people shopping, munching and drinking  to mellow jazzy tunes every Saturday.

Further away:

Daytrip lunch: Bar bar black sheep – funky little courtyard restaurant with mismatched tables and quirky food and interesting local wine. About an hour from CT in the Swartland.

Winelands fine dining: Terroir- sublime food set in cozy courtyard at Kleine Zalze.

Weekend away foodie treat: Gaatjie- tiny restaurant where west coast ingredients are cooked up with finesse. In Paternoster, a small fishing village 2.5 hours from Cape Town (this was the last stop on our drive from London to Cape Town). Stay at Suzi’s Salt Coast B&B down the road. Review to follow soon (hint to dearest husband time for a weekend away).

We ventured out to Gugulethu, “Gugs”, on a chilly Saturday night and I am glad we did. I don’t think I have ever been to a wine festival with such a joyous atmosphere. People were actually being  friendly to each other. No snootiness and pretension from exhibitors or tasters. The tents on the roof of the shopping mall were heaving with people having a good time. Some of the wineries present were Nederburg, Groot Constantia and Asara. I tasted Creation wines for the first time and was blown away. I am bleak I didn’t take their Merlot to Le Fake Wine Club last week.

This was the first wine festival organized in Gugulethu and I hope it will be an even bigger affair next year. I also hope to see more wineries taking time off from wooing the Chinese to address this growing market right at their doorstep.

Finally I hope to see more of the Gugulethans at the other foodie events as it seems my dear mother in law might move there in search of fun otherwise.