.: Womens' Day celebration media preview at Lanzerac

Lanzerac’s historic Manor House

The main room of our very commodious suite, huge comfortable bed with percale linen at one end...

...lounge, TV and desk area with TV at the other. Note the beautiful traditional teak doors

The courtyard outside our suite

Our dressing room

The enormous bathroom with a ball and claw bath to soak in, a modern rain shower and a separate loo. The end door leads to a private walled garden.

Double basin seen from the other end

A tiny study area between the bathroom and the dressing room

Our suite was in one of the older buildings on the farm

Help yourself to tea and coffee and an extra treat left for us, a plate of petite fours for teatime

The modern winery from the outside

and the entrance to the tasting room and the winery

Tables set up and ready for an extensive tasting

Gleaming steel wine fermentation tanks in the cellar

Lots of maturing wines in the barrel cellar

Chocolates for sale in the tasting room

Staff and a customer in the tasting room

You can order the snack platter with cheese and charcuterie and a glass of chilled white wine

Smiling and friendly tasting room staff: Lucia Carolus, Gwen Claasen and Amos Sobashe

Entrance to the reception area with a row of cottages in the background

A glossy Hadeda Ibis searching the damp lawn for worms

Our small walled courtyard with fountain. This must be where our late night guest gained entry to the suite (see his picture at the end).

A beautiful arrangement of flowers in our suite

Lanzerac is a National Monument and this is its plaque from the National Monuments Council, dated 1979

The entrance to the old Manor house which has four large suites and a library

When we walked through this doorway a flock of about 40 very noisy Hadeda ibis took flight. They get their name from the loud hadeda sound they make.

The restaurant terrace - a great place for summer al fresco meals, but a bit too cool for winter evenings

A winter sunset over the Werf – the central courtyard area surrounded by the farm buildings

The elegant dining room with the table set up for our party

The minstrel’s gallery. It reminded us of the days of Lanzerac’s cheese lunches which we both enjoyed so much.

Another area of the restaurant with doors leading out to the terrace

A view of the Esquire lounge which is a late night Whisky and Cigar bar..

..where we met for pre-dinner drinks and were ably served by the bar’s excellent manager

Welcomed by a roaring fire and a glass of Kaapse Vonkel

Jenny and David Morris. Jenny was hosting the evening - as she will on Friday, 9th August, when Lanzerac will celebrate Womens' Day. And you too can be there.

Jenny tells us all about the evening to come and about the Womens’ day weekend special

She introduces us to Hans Steyn, General Manager of Lanzerac.

Seated at the long table, Jenny tells us about the meal we are about to have

and two of the guests are busy tweeting while Wynand Lategan, the Winemaker, tells us about the wines

The menu. Good food, all paired with Lanzerac wines

The amuse bouche was a tiny crisp duck spring roll with Asian flavours

The delicious starter of Franschhoek salmon trout, crumbed asparagus and a softly poached quail egg

The next course of pan seared scallops and a slow cooked shredded pork tortelloni (did you know that a tortelloni is larger than a tortellini?) This was topped with a delicate parmesan crisp and dressed with a lovely butternut and cardamom puree. A very luxurious and very well put together dish which went very well indeed with the Lanzerac Mrs English 2011 Chardonnay.

An apple lemon and celery sorbet is then served to cleanse the palate. Delightful and the very concentrated flavours really refreshed.

PRO Pippa Pringle, who put the media evening together, chats to Bolander Journalist Norman McFarlane

Lanzerac’s young but very knowledgeable chef Stephen Fraser. Originally from Wales, Stephen has worked internationally and gained a lot of experience for someone his age. This shows in his perfectly prepared and presented food. It is apparent that he is a perfectionist and does things the right way and well. We suspect that, when more of you taste his food, his career will go far.

Here he explains his menu and what we are about to eat.

There were two choices for main course: This is the Maple Roast Salmon on spiced lentils with curried mussels and a beetroot relish.

Lynne’s choice was the Rosemary crusted venison loin, which was blesbok, a game new to her. It was amazingly tender without being pappy and has superb flavour. It came with a mushroom polenta slice, roast baby turnips, a sweet pea mousse and a very rich master stock jus.

Samarie Smith, Media 24 Lifestyle Editor, and Norman McFarlane enjoying the evening.

Jenny tells us about Stephen and we were able to ask him some questions about himself and the food

Dessert was a poem of a classic blueberry and hazelnut cheesecake. Yes, Lynne cleared her plate and especially enjoyed the light as air crisp crème anglaise filled profiteroles. This was served with Lanzerac’s Dessert wine and this was another perfect match, the sugar and the acids balancing out the rich cheesecake and fruit.