Back to Blighty
Jude and I had an incredible holiday in South Africa where we found some really good (and good value) Pinot Noir. That was a first. By Kate
Back from a proper long holiday and Jude and I are brown as, well, as brown as people who have lived in ferocious sun for three weeks. The tans are fading fast but I am hoping that the general feeling of wellbeing and energy (I had totally forgotten what that was like) will linger for a lot longer.
We did two days of work and the rest was pure holiday. Of course, work in a very hot place, seeing our favourite producers and catching up with Tyson and Unathi, is not really the most arduous sort of labour.
First to Tyson (as seen tasting with Jude, below). Doing completely brilliantly at Spier. We would urge any visitors to the Cape to pop in and see him at the wine tasting centre there. We spent a day with him and Unathi, who won the scholarship last March and whose visa is still in the process of being sorted. We continue to plug away. It is too important not to. For all the glitz of Cape Town
Unathi was completely charming though – very funny and very keen, so we now really can’t wait to get her over.
The big wine surprise of the visit was Pinot Noir. I have been saying for years now thatSouth Africa Elgin
Food remains variable. Having said that, the improvement on even a few years ago was vast. The phenomenon of style over substance is not unique to the Cape but given that many of the fashionable places are breathtakingly, beautifully stylish, the disappointing food seems somehow even more so. Places where we had really good meals this time :
Tokara Wine Estate
London , I would’ve sworn on my life that I was in California South Africa
The Grand
Apparently, there are two, one in Camps Bay
Essentially a warehouse plonked in a building site (the drive up to it is confusing, to say the least), the inside is very shabby chic and industrial glamour with a long bar down the one side and an open kitchen at the back. A wood burning pizza oven fronts this up with surely the most industrious pizza chef in the world, a relatively young woman, churning out sheets of very delectable looking pizzas.
A beach has been constructed which runs right down to the waterfront and tables, chairs, and collections of sofas and sun loungers are planted in the sand, in front of extensive decking which contains more outside tables. The food is really no better than fine, but it isn’t bad and also, surprisingly, not horrendously expensive (although not cheap).
The wine list leaves almost everything to be desired and I would caution not touching the House sparkling with a very long barge pole, but it is quite a fabulous place and very well worth a visit. Apparently, booking is essential as there are severe, clipboard wielding ladies who accost one at the entrance, which is very boring. Still worth it though. 
Outside ofCape Town and surrounds, we had a fantastic fishy meal at a place right in the harbour in Mussel Bay Mussel Bay
We enjoyed a very good meal at 96 Winery Road
Also at Hermanos in Hermanus. Small and owned by the chef in the kitchen, which is often a good sign, it has a really good wine list (although a very disappointing by-the-glass section) and the service is both charming and good – quite a rare combination inSouth Africa
As to the bad, well, it was astonishingly so. The award for the very worst meal goes to Aloe Grove Guest Farm just outside Queenstown in the Eastern Cape
The rondawel rooms were still very appealing as were the couple who recently bought the place. When we arrived on a Sunday afternoon we were informed by the wife that we were their only guests. There had been a big wedding the night before and both her and her husband looked exhausted. Well, in his case, exhausted and hung over. She said that we could have dinner any time we wanted, so we asked for 6.30pm as, having missed lunch due to a complete dearth of places to stop in the middle of theKaroo , we were as hungry as horses.
Incidentally, South Africa may have very long stretches of road with not much on them, but in places like the Karoo, you do come across little picnic spots with tables and chairs every few miles, always somewhere with a great view. If you are prepared and you have your own food, you can eat some superlative meals in incredible surroundings - although you will probably want to turn your back on the road. I do remember my American grandmother being utterly disparaging of people who stopped at such places and now for the life of me I can’t imagine why.
Anyway, we made sure we were in the deserted dining room at 6.15pm, truly ravenous. The hungover husband offered drinks and then disappeared into the kitchen. To get menus, we thought.
We thought wrong.
He emerged about 3 minutes later with two plates heaped with food. Clearly, these had been microwaved. They had the strangely sickly pallor of food that has been reheated one to many times. He put them down with a flourish. Jude and I stared at the plates in astonishment. I can safely say that in all my life I have never been presented with something that looked quite that unappetising.
There was grey broccoli with a separated sauce, cauliflower of a similar hue, several slices of a meat that quite literally looked like slivers of boot leather, a chunk of soggy pastry which concealed some congealed chicken and some worryingly bright orange butternut/sweet potato mush. We looked back at him. He clearly did not find the state of what was on our plates at all out of the ordinary as there was not even a flicker of mortification. Instead, he cheerfully offered us drinks.
Obviously, you get what you get at Aloe Grove. Such new- fangled ideas as menu choices have apparently not yet reached this corner of the Eastern Cape Jude manfully sawed through the boot leather. He said that if he pretended it was biltong, it wasn’t so bad. I picked at the vegetables. They all tasted the same apart from the butternut stuff which was so sweet, it could have been a dessert. Thank God we had a stash of rusks back in our room.
Breakfast was pretty bad too. Jude ordered eggs and brown toast with tomatoes after a very large and very solemn lady had run through a litany of cooked breakfast options. A plate heaped with bacon, sausages and white toast arrived, also with indecent haste.
We left quickly and sped off to our beloved Coffee Bay
Unathi was completely charming though – very funny and very keen, so we now really can’t wait to get her over.
The big wine surprise of the visit was Pinot Noir. I have been saying for years now that
The Grand
Essentially a warehouse plonked in a building site (the drive up to it is confusing, to say the least), the inside is very shabby chic and industrial glamour with a long bar down the one side and an open kitchen at the back. A wood burning pizza oven fronts this up with surely the most industrious pizza chef in the world, a relatively young woman, churning out sheets of very delectable looking pizzas.
The wine list leaves almost everything to be desired and I would caution not touching the House sparkling with a very long barge pole, but it is quite a fabulous place and very well worth a visit.
Outside of
Also at Hermanos in Hermanus. Small and owned by the chef in the kitchen, which is often a good sign, it has a really good wine list (although a very disappointing by-the-glass section) and the service is both charming and good – quite a rare combination in
The rondawel rooms were still very appealing as were the couple who recently bought the place. When we arrived on a Sunday afternoon we were informed by the wife that we were their only guests. There had been a big wedding the night before and both her and her husband looked exhausted. Well, in his case, exhausted and hung over. She said that we could have dinner any time we wanted, so we asked for 6.30pm as, having missed lunch due to a complete dearth of places to stop in the middle of the
He emerged about 3 minutes later with two plates heaped with food. Clearly, these had been microwaved. They had the strangely sickly pallor of food that has been reheated one to many times.
There was grey broccoli with a separated sauce, cauliflower of a similar hue, several slices of a meat that quite literally looked like slivers of boot leather, a chunk of soggy pastry which concealed some congealed chicken and some worryingly bright orange butternut/sweet potato mush.
