Spiral. Looking up the 6 storey spiral staircase at the Zeitz MOCAA,
like a huge mechanical eye
Spring was here.... and then, typically, it
changed its mind. It tucked itself back into its box and let Winter stay with us
for a while longer. Last Sunday, on the way through Constantia to a friend's
birthday celebration, we passed beautiful spring flowers massed along the edge
of the road in the sunshine. For most of this week, including today, when we were at the celebration of the Amorim Cork MCC Awards, it was cold, cloudy and damp. But the weather forecast says that it will
clear up tomorrow, so maybe Spring is coming back. But the good news is that
our dam levels have reached 70%, which is better than we've had for a couple of
years, but we still need to be careful about using water. Enjoy this week's
stories…
We were invited to an awards presentation in Somerset West at 3.30 in the afternoon last week and, to make going out there worthwhile, we decided to try out one of the local restaurants for a bite of lunch. Friends who live there, depressingly, told us that this is where restaurants go to die, so we were a bit cautious. Then a friend in our industry said “Try Pajamas and Jam, just off the N2, they are good”. So here we are. Not difficult to find it; just look for the Sikorsky S61 helicopter on top of the building. You take the turning to the right off the N2, just before the bridge (heading for Sir Lowry’s Pass). It is at 32 van Zyl Street, off Fabriek Road…
WineMag invited us to join them at the
release of the results of the second annual (2018) Pinot Noir Report, to see
the top scorers get their certificates and taste the top wines. The event was
held last week at Idiom Wine Estate in Sir Lowry’s Pass high above Somerset West and the Strand…
The Zeitz MOCAA is a museum of contemporary African art. It is also, in a way, a sculpture on its own; a reincarnation of the old grain silo in the Cape Town harbour. The silo tubes have been carved out to create new spaces and wonderful shapes which lend themselves to photographic compositions. This makes it an interesting exercise for a photographer, but so do the interactions between visitors, the art works and the building itself. Most of the photographs do not need captions. On Heritage Day this week, the museum was open free to local residents and we decided to take advantage of the offer. There was also a special Cape Malay lunch in the museum restaurant, so we booked for that as well…
We eat a lot of vegetables – because we enjoy
them. So, wondering how to cook some good pork sausages differently, Lynne
looked in our fridge and came up with this idea. The Americans would call this
a tray bake; it rather more resembles a Moroccan tagine or French Tian. The
pork bangers we had were plump and full of flavour; buy the best you can get,
they will reward you. The vegetables in this were what we had in the fridge;
you can make your own choices, but you must use the cherry tomatoes, garlic, olive
oil and the herbs. Click here or on the title to see the
whole recipe
South
African Méthode Cap Classique has been around since Frans Malan made the first
Kaapse Vonkel at Simonsig in 1971. Made in the traditional French method, this
beautiful rendition is not allowed to be called Champagne, but many of our
talented winemakers are able to make superb wines of quality and finesse in
this style. We love drinking it; we always try to welcome guests with a bottle
of bubbly. It must be served at
celebrations, breakfast, lunch, dinner, picnics, with luxurious food like duck paté,
smoked salmon and caviar and it goes perfectly with rich desserts. In fact, we
don’t need any excuses to pop the cork on a bottle, or two. Today, over lunch
at the Amorim Cap Classique Challenge for 2018, we tasted the wines awarded the
top accolades in South Africa, much more about which next week. The wine that
impressed us more than the others, and they are all excellent, is our Wine of the Week…
27th September 2018
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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2018
PS If a word or name is in bold type and underlined, click on it for more information
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
