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Thursday, October 23, 2014

Saxenburg launches new Drunken Fowl Shiraz

The launch of this “easy drinking” shiraz aimed at the younger market was held at Voila! in Bantry Bay

It will be selling in the region of R65 to R70 on the farm and in the trade. It has been introduced by the son Vincent and daughter Fiona of the owners of the farm Adrian and Birgit Bührer, who were also at the launch. It turned into rather a long cocktail party and the young folk were enjoying themselves a lot. It was a treat to see Winemaker Nico van der Merwe who has been rather ill and is now on the road to recovery

Enjoying a glass of Saxenburg MCC while we wait for proceedings to start

The Saxenburg MCC

Winemaker Nico van der Merwe introduces the wine

Adrian and Birgit Bührer

Fiona Bührer speaks about the label

and Vincent speaks about the concept

Nico van der Merwe with Platter editor Philip van Zyl

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Nedbank Green Wine Awards lunch at Myoga in The Vineyard Hotel

We lunched at Myoga restaurant at The Vineyard to witness the presentation of these awards. We are very impressed at the huge improvement in the wines entered but we are interested to see how long the low sulphur wines will last in the bottle. To quote judge François Rautenbach: ‘Overall, the organic category looks much better than ever before! It’s as though there’s been an appreciable move towards commercialisation and upping quality.’ Impressive is the growing commitment of the industry to get involved in biodiversity. However, we still need the Government to legislate on what is properly considered to be organic produce in this country. There are no national rules, only self applied ones based on what overseas countries are doing and they vary a lot. We support the industry BioDiversity initiatives as they are focusing their time and money on very worthwhile projects. Click here to see the awards and see the excellent lunch produced by Mike Basset and his staff.

*Winning Wines

Best wines made from Organically Grown Grapes

Best Wine Overall – Reyneke Chenin Blanc 2013

Best Red – Waverley Hills CW Reserve Shiraz 2011

Best White – Reyneke Chenin Blanc 2013

Bloggers’ Choice – Waverley Hills Shiraz/Mourvedre/Viognier 2011

Best Value – Nederburg Earthbound Chenin Blanc 2014

Best Biodiversity and Wine Initiative Wines

Best Wine Overall – Hermanuspietersfontein Die Bartho 2012

Best Red – Cederberg Cabernet Sauvignon 2012

Best White – Hermanuspietersfontein Die Bartho 2012

Bloggers’ Choice – Neethlingshof The Maria 2014

Best Value – Jordan Chameleon Sauvignon Blanc Chardonnay 2013

*Best Farming Practises Winners

Overall Winner – La Motte

Runner-up – Vondeling

Best Contribution to Conservation – Paul Cluver

Best Contribution to Farming Practices and Production Integrity – Bartinney

Best (Sustainable) Contribution to Tourism – La Motte

Best Contribution to Community Development – La Motte

You need to title all the names

White wine and canapés on the terrace

Smiling staff welcome us

The restaurant set up for the tasting, awards and lunch

A canapé sir?

Getting to know each other at the table

Choux canapés

Ian Dinan, publisher of Getaway magazine, MC for the awards, opens the proceedings

Sydney Mbhele, Divisional Executive for Integrated Marketing at Nedbank.

Parmesan crisps, asparagus sprues and shredded parma ham canapé

What we are going to taste with lunch. And yes they were all winners of awards

First course was a deconstructed waterblommetjie and monkfish ‘bredie’ (stew) with crispy lemon gnocchi. They were really delicious. Served with the best value BWI award winner Jordan 2013 Chameleon blend of sauvignon and chardonnay.

A happy Mike Bampfield Duggan of Wine Concepts

Entre was a mystery to start with then we realized it was the tea smoked salmon covered in a licorice gel with pressed and crisp parsley apple squares on one side of the plate and an Umame paste with condensed milk and a boquerones (white anchovy) 'on toast’ . The salmon was perfect, moist and gently smoked and the gel was not overwhelmingly licorice. The boquerone was rather too sharp and acidic. This course went with the two Waverley Hills red wines

Head judge Fiona McDonald tells us about the judges experiences

Smile for the camera Neil Pendock and Greg Landman!

Chef Mike Basset explains the menu and how they did the pairings

We are having a great time. Natalie Ritsch and Anel Blignaut, both judges on the The Best Farming Practices category

Main course of beautifully cooked loin of springbok served with a cauliflower ‘risotto’ below the ground vegetable, cured bacon cooked in salted molasses caramel. It was lovely except for the burnt leeks on top. Carbon is thought to cause cancer, we don’t want to eat it.

Dessert was a stone fruit compote with vanilla, burnt white chocolate and caramel nougat, toasted almonds and mascarpone meringue roulade. Very, very sweet and enjoyed a lot by those with a very sweet tooth. Went perfectly with the Neethlingshof The Maria 2014 a noble late harvest dessert wine

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Veritas Award winners tasted at the CTICC

Cape Wine Master Bennie Howard, doing his accustomed great job as MC

Marketing managers Righard Theron of De Grendel and Bennie Stipp of DeWetshof

Adre and Hermann Kirschbaum of Buitenverwachting

Margi Hoffe, Anura Vineyards Brand Manager, shows us 2009, 2013 and 2014 vintages of their excellent sauvignon blanc

Natalie Kuhne, Allee Bleue assistant winemaker

Nederburg White Wine maker Natasha Williams shows us the 1979 Nederburg Edelkeur Chenin blanc Noble Late Harvest

and lets us taste it

Brandon Smit, Madri Dreyer and André Rousseau

It was a very well attended show

High Road consultant wine maker Mark Carmichael-Green with Karin Visser and co-owner Les Sweidan

Saronsberg winemaker Dewalt Heyns

Perdeberg winemaker Riaan Möller discusses their great Chenin blanc with Lynne

KWV winemakers Johann Fourie and Izele van Blerk with Laborie winemaker Kobus van der Merwe with the magnificent 1929 KWV Reserve Port

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Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Main Ingredient's MENU - The White Room, Elim Festival, Mariana's, Cabo Esperança Wines, Gooey Chocolate Pudding

Main Ingredient’s weekly E-Journal

Gourmet Foods & Ingredients

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An olive thrush in Mariana’s garden, contemplating which of a feast of mulberries he should choose next

In this week’s MENU:

The White Room at Dear Me

The Elim Wine & Food Celebration

Mariana’s in Stanford

La Vie en Rose with Kyle’s Cabo Esperança Wines

This week’s recipe: Gooey Chocolate Pudding

Important festivals this month

Food and wine (and a few other) events for you to enjoy

Learn about wine and cooking

To get the whole of our story, please click on “READ ON.....” at the end of each paragraph, which will lead you to the related blog, with pictures and more words. At the end of each blog, click on RETURN TO MENU to come back to the blog version of MENU.

This week’s Product menu One of the all-time favourite flavours is real vanilla and we have been finding it in various dishes we have tasted recently, including this week’s recipe. We stock some of the world’s best vanilla and other extracts in the Nielsen Massey range. See them here

A week filled with good food, good friends and even some relaxation by the sea. We have had good and, sadly, some spectacularly bad food over the last couple of weeks. This week it was all good.

The White Room at Dear Me On Friday night, we visited The White Room at Dear Me, having been invited to taste the Five Course food and wine pairing menu at this Cape Town restaurant, which has just been placed in the Eat Out Top 20 list of best restaurants in South Africa, and is nominated for a place in the top 10. The timing couldn't have been better. Chef Vanessa Marx is over the moon with joy at her nomination and, having tasted the food, we think she deserves it. Two of her dishes really intrigued, amazed and delighted us. Read on

The Elim Wine & Food Celebration Early on Saturday morning, we picked up our friends and, trusting our GPS, headed off to the wilds near the southern tip of Africa, Cape Agulhas. We have learned, lately, not to trust the GPS implicitly, as this was another occasion when it got its directions horribly wrong and took us on a detour on very bumpy dirt roads. But, when we reached Black Oystercatcher Winery in Elim, we knew that the 3½ hour trip had been worth it. It was a real old fashioned country wine and food festival with the lovely wines of the area and masses of food stalls, music and other entertainment. Given the distance, we were amazed how many people from Cape Town had been attracted to the fiesta. Read on

Mariana’s in Stanford After our visit to the Elim Festival, we spent the night at a friend’s daughter’s holiday house in De Kelders, where we had a lovely relaxing evening and morning, reading papers and our books, cooking huge prawns for supper, watching whales and poachers, getting some sun while doing the crossword and then it was time to head over to Stanford, where we had managed to get a reservation for lunch. We have not been for several years, as this small restaurant is amazingly popular (deservedly so) and bookings are hard to get. We were warmly welcomed by Peter Esterhuizen and given a lovely table outside on the vine-covered terrace, facing Mariana’s legendary vegetable garden. Then came the wonderful food. Read On

La Vie en Rose with Kyle’s Cabo Esperança Wines Kyle Martin has long been a business friend. He used to sell us wine when we had the shop and has remained a personal friend ever since. Recently, he started up his own wine business, Cabo Esperança Wines representing, initially, four good wine producers: Blackwater Wines, Keermont, Oak Valley and Vondeling. His inaugural trade tasting was held at La Vie Café Bar, on the beachfront at Rocklands, on Monday evening and we tasted some really special and two very unusual wines. Read On

This week’s recipe: Gooey Chocolate Pudding

John’s chocolate pudding at Mariana’s was so delicious that Lynne thought she would find you a similar one and this tried and tested recipe comes from Willie Harcourt-Cooze. You do need to use the best dark 70% or 80% chocolate that you can find. The recipe calls for unsalted butter, but all chocolate is improved by the addition of a little salt, so we use ordinary salted butter; you can choose. You might get more than 6 puddings out of this, so have a couple of extra ramekins ready for the overflow. Confusingly, he recommends 6 to 8, but it might depend on the size of your ramekins. You could also use small coffee cups. You make this just before serving, so get all your ingredients ready

180g 70% dark bitter chocolate – 200g unsalted butter – 175g caster sugar – 6 extra large eggs – 2 teaspoon real vanilla extract – 40g ground almonds

Preheat the oven to 160°C. Grease 6 ramekins. Melt the chocolate and butter, with 60g of sugar, in a bowl over a pan of simmering water. Do not allow the base of the bowl to touch the water. You could also melt the chocolate in the microwave. In another bowl slightly beat the eggs with the remaining caster sugar and the vanilla extract till pale. Stir the ground almonds into the melted chocolate mix. Then gently fold this mixture into the eggs. Divide between the ramekins and bake for 12 to 15 minutes. The tops will rise and start splitting when they are ready to serve. Serve immediately with thick cream.

You can also add dried fruit soaked in alcohol for a more adult pudding. Brandied cherries would be superb.

Important festivals this month Robertson’s great annual Wine on the River Festival starts this Friday and ends on Sunday. It is one of the best wine events of the year and we will be there on Sunday. Caroline’s White Wine Review will be at the Table Bay on Tuesday, October 21st. Tickets are in short supply, so book as soon as you can. Durbanville’s Season of Sauvignon takes place on twelve Durbanville farms on Saturday and Sunday, October 25th and 26th.

Food and wine (and a few other) events for you to enjoy

There is a huge and rapidly growing variety of interesting things to occupy your leisure time here in the Western Cape. There are so many interesting things to do in our world of food and wine that we have made separate list for each type of event for which we have information. To see what’s happening in our world of food and wine (and a few other cultural events), visit our list of wine and food pairing dinners, list of Special events with wine and/or food connections, list of Wine Shows and Tastings and list of special dinner events. All the events are listed in date order and we have a large number of exciting events to entertain you right through the year. Events outside the Western Cape are listed here.

Learn about wine and cooking We receive a lot of enquiries from people who want to learn more about wine. Cathy Marston and The Cape Wine Academy both run wine education courses, some very serious and others more geared to fun. You can see details of Cathy’s WSET and other courses here and here and the CWA courses here. Karen Glanfield has taken over the UnWined wine appreciation courses from Cathy. See the details here

The Hurst Campus, an accredited school for people who want to become professional chefs, has a variety of courses. See the details here

Chez Gourmet in Claremont has a programme of cooking classes. A calendar of their classes can be seen here.

In addition to the new Sense of Taste Culinary Arts School, Chef Peter Ayub runs a four module course for keen home cooks at his Maitland complex. Details here

Nadège Lepoittevin-Dasse has French cooking classes in Noordhoek and conducts cooking tours to Normandy. You can see more details here.

Emma Freddi runs the Enrica Rocca cooking courses at her home in Constantia.

Lynn Angel runs the Kitchen Angel cooking school and does private dinners at her home. She holds hands-on cooking classes for small groups on Monday and Thursday evenings and she has decided to introduce LCHF (Banting classes). The Kitchen Confidence classes, which focus on essential cooking skills and methods, have been expanded and are now taught over 2 evenings. She continues to host private dining and culinary team building events at her home. She trained with Raymond Blanc, and has been a professional chef for 25 years. More info here

16th October 2014

Remember - if you can’t find something, we’ll do our best to get it for you, and, if you’re in Cape Town or elsewhere in the country, we can send it to you! Check our online shop for details and prices.

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Phones: +27 21 439 3169 / 083 229 1172 / 083 656 4169

Postal address: 60 Arthurs Rd, Sea Point 8005

Our Adamastor & Bacchus© tailor-made Wine, Food and Photo tours take small groups (up to 6) to specialist wine producers who make the best of South Africa’s wines. Have fun while you learn more about wine and how it is made! Tours can be conducted in English, German, Norwegian and standard or Dutch-flavoured Afrikaans.

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. Our Avast!^® Anti-Virus software is updated at least daily and our system is scanned continually for viruses.

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