Clouds forming over the mountains in the
Winelands
- An Expression of Chenin Blanc at Grande Provence
- A Celebration of Glenelly’s flagship wine
- A Tour of her Glass Museum with the owner of Glenelly, Mme May de Lencquesaing
- Wine Concepts Craft Festival
- What’s on the Menu this week. Essence of Tomato Soup
- MENU’s Wines of the Week
How wonderful it is to start this week’s MENU on a note of
optimism. Clouds have appeared and a cloud has lifted.
What a week. On Tuesday night the heavens announced loudly a
possible change in the weather, which sadly, violent though it was, didn't
last. On Wednesday night we all finally got what we had been waiting for. No,
not rain, we live in hope for that, but a new President. It was a day like no
other; at times we thought we were in cloud cuckoo land, there were so many
twists and turns, steps forward and back, stand offs and threats of possible
gunfights at the OK Corral, but at near midnight, when most of the nation was
tucked up on bed, Zuma resigned and has been followed by a man whose first
speech in Parliament was statesmanlike and gives us hope that we may at last
have a government that works for the people. Lynne wanted to rush out and blow
the car horn to alert everyone. There is euphoria in the air. Now we have
to watch carefully, to see what happens next.
Tomatoes are in season. This is not quite Christophe Dehosse's
amazing tomato soup (illustrated above) which we wrote about this week, but you can add what he did
and make this more complex. If you use good flavourful tomatoes like Roma or
huge beef tomatoes, you will capture the flavour. This cold soup, which does
not require any cooking, is a light starter for 3 or 4 people, not complicated
to make and looks very pretty. There are lovely ripe tomatoes in the markets at
the moment.
1 kilo of ripe red
tomatoes, beef or Roma - 1 small clove of garlic - 1 tspn each of fresh
marjoram, basil and parsley - salt and pepper - 1 or 2 extra tomatoes - 10 cm
fresh cucumber - 1 dessertspoon chopped chives, - some torn basil - a few micro
herbs - good green extra virgin olive oil
Cut a small cross in the top of each tomato. Drop them into
a litre of boiling water for just a minute or two, then remove them and put
into iced water. You can then easily remove their skins, their cores and their
pips. Liquidise the remaining tomato flesh with the chopped garlic and the
herbs. Then put them into a muslin or very fine mesh sieve or jelly bag to
drip, and you will have essence of tomato, which you will then need to season
gently with salt and pepper. You can make this a day in advance and chill. Skin,
core and deseed the extra tomato and cut the flesh into tiny 1 cm squares. Do
the same with some slices of cucumber; you can leave the skin on. You only need
about 2 to 3 tablespoons of each. When ready to serve, adjust the seasoning and
add the tomato and cucumber squares. Top with the chives and other herbs and a
drop or two of good green olive oil. You can also add some cold cooked or
ceviche peeled prawns. Do not use raw, it is too dangerous. If you want to
stretch this further, add some clear sieved vegetable stock.
MENU’s Wines of the Week. There are
two, a white and a red that both impressed us so much
Grande Provence Chenin Blanc 2017
is Hagen Viljoen's first
wine for Grande Provence. A dusty nose with hints of English gooseberries, at
first it is dry on the palate then the fruit powerfully bursts through, golden
apricots, passion fruit, guava and a nice citrus shot of acidity. We were
served some good sourdough bread and an unusual nut dip, the wine was very
special in this combination
The Glenelly Lady May 2012,
which is just being launched. It
has incense wood notes with layers of deep cassis, cherry and berry fruit,
fresh and slightly warmly alcoholic. It was a poem with the roast lamb we had
for lunch and
is also one to put in your cellar for a year or three
16th February 2018
© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2017
Phones: +27 21 439 3169 / 083 229 1172 / 083 656 4169
Postal address: 60 Arthurs Rd, Sea Point 8005
Recommendations of products and outside events are not solicited or charged for, and are made at the authors’ pleasure. All photographs, recipes and text used in these newsletters and our blogs are © John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus. Our restaurant reviews are usually unsolicited. We prefer to pay for our meals and not be paid in any way by anyone. Whether we are invited or go independently, we don’t feel bad if we say we didn’t like it. Honesty is indeed our best policy. While every effort is made to avoid mistakes, we are human and they do creep in occasionally, for which we apologise. This electronic journal has been sent to you because you have personally subscribed to it or because someone you know has asked us to send it to you or forwarded it to you themselves. Addresses given to us will not be divulged to any person or organisation. We collect them only for our own promotional purposes. If you wish to be added to our mailing list, please click here to send us a message and if you wish to be removed from our mailing list, please click here to send us a me
