voted by the public for wine farms offering the best tourism product 

were presented on the rooftop terrace of a firm in De Waterkant

Tina Jewell (Bread & Wine), Heidi Cilliers and Kathy Brewer (Villiera)

Lynne with Jan Loubscher and Anel Grobler (Spit or Swallow)

Ian du Toit (EDT PR), Kathy Brewer and Righard Theron (De Grendel)

Fun on the rooftop at DHK Architects

Angelo and Tina Casu (Grand Dedale, Wellington)

Derick Henstra made the opening speech

Mike Bampfield Duggan (Wine Concepts) and Mike Ratcliffe (Warwick Wines)

Monika Elias, Klink Awards originator, tells the story

with a phone, everyone can be a photographer

Errieda du Toit tweets on her iPad

Danie Nel, official photographer

Monika speaks about the Klink Awards

to an audience filled with anticipation

A little bubbly to calm the nerves

Mike Ratcliffe announcing the names of the winners

And the winners are:

 Beyond Expectations - Award for Great Food and Excellent Value

Situated between the Klink awards for bistro-style country cuisine and fine dining, this award is for a Winelands restaurant in the mid-price category that serves seriously good food at very fair prices, attracting foodies by raising the bar and presenting local garden and winelands produce with passion and contemporary culinary style.

Winner:  Haute Cabrière

34.38% received

 Comfort Zone - Award for Best Bistro or Café on a Wine Farm

This award goes to the best bistro or café in the Cape Winelands at a venue that combines quality, cuisine, setting and service without all the frills of silver service. We were looking for venues that source local, artisanal farm produce and showcase good food and wine in an informal, relaxed style as well as offer value-for-money on own wines and wines served by the glass.

Winner: Harvest at Laborie

26.24% received

 

Connoisseur - Award for Best Cellar Tasting Experience

This award goes to the cellar which offers the best vintage wine tasting experience. Criteria include the welcome and wine knowledge of staff, the use of the correct wine glasses, the condition of wine samples, the range of vintage wine releases available, the availability of vertical flights of flagship wines , the range of unique wines available at cellar-door only.

Winner: Fairview Master Tasting

34.12% received

 Country Comfort - Award for Boutique Accommodation on a Wine Estate

The winner of this category offers boutique accommodation on a wine farm that promises something extraordinary in a vineyard setting, whether that be in a Cape Dutch manor house or a luxury guesthouse. The winning venue will capture the romance of a wine farm getaway and offer world-class accommodation.

Winner: Doolhof Grand Dédale

37.72% received

 

Crowd Pleaser - Award for Best Wine Route Event

This award goes to the most popular wine route event on the annual Winelands calendar - an event that draws repeat visitors year after year, helps to build a regional wine brand and market a specific wine route destination.

Winner: Durbanville Wine Valley’s Seasons of Sauvignon

31.07% received

Delicious Deli - Award for Best Deli on a Wine Farm

These days, cellar-door delis sell all manner of goodies: estate olives and olive oils, artisanal breads, cheeses and charcuterie, boutique chocolates and nougat, organic vegetables, farm honey, jams, pickles and picnic baskets. This award recognises the top cellar-door deli, one that tempts wine tourists with an authentic range of traditional and contemporary Winelands produce grown on the farm or sourced locally from artisanal producers.

Winner: Fairview Deli

31.16% received

 Family Day Out - Award for Best Child-Friendly Venue on a Wine Farm

This award goes to a wine farm where you can take the whole family and the kids are taken care of in a safe environment. There must be something for everyone here. The adults can relax and enjoy their wine experience - while a kids' menu, special kids' activities or a kids’ playground for all ages keeps everyone happy on a day out in the Winelands.

Winner: Blaauwklippen

50.6% received

 

Gourmet - Award for Best Gourmet Restaurant at the Cellar Door

This award goes to the best of the best cellar-door restaurants in the Cape Winelands - those gastronomic destinations with signature chefs who create cuisine on the cutting edge to attract domestic and foreign wine tourists. We were looking for restaurants which pay great attention to detail in terms of an overall cellar-door experience, have a great location, first-class service, a focus on artisanal and local Winelands produce, seasonal menus, tasting menus which expertly pair food and wine, a sommelier service and a wine list which showcases older vintages, own wines and/or regional wines at the cellar door.

Winner: Pierneef à La Motte

28.25% received

 

Happy Times - Award for Most Memorable Wine Route.

This award goes to the most popular wine route selected by wine tourists who cherish memories of their experience of a particular wine region because of its ambience, accessibility, scenic beauty, soul, sense of community, family tradition and heritage, warmth, friendliness, culinary offerings, etc. These criteria all go into the memory mix.

Winner: Franschhoek Wine Valley

30.29% received

Percale - Award for Best Accommodation on a Wine Farm

This award goes to the best of the best, exclusive luxury hotel accommodation on a wine farm or Wine Route. Criteria include the highest standards in terms of location (landscape/scenery), style, reception welcome, quality and comfort of en-suite rooms, facilities, personalised service, and add-on attractions such as a restaurant, room service and mod-cons such as wifi and satellite television.

Winner: Majeka House

41.74% received

Tread Gently - Award for Most Green Wine Farm 

The wine farm that sets the standard for green, planet-friendly farming practices in terms of sustainable viticulture and wine production, biodiversity and conservation initiatives, as well as organic or biodynamic viticulture is celebrated with this award.

Winner: Villiera

37% received

 

Warm Family Welcome - Award for Best Cellar Door Experience

This award acknowledges a family wine farm that offers the warmest country welcome. One that retains the authenticity of its Cape heritage while investing in a cellar-door experience and goes out of its way to make a visit to the cellar door a special experience - making wine tourists feel they are sharing in the special family heritage of the farm and the Winelands

Winner: Delheim

42.79% received

 

Wild Card - Award for Most Unusual Attraction on a Wine Route

Celebrating the most unusual and memorable attraction on a wine farm, this award is for a destination that offers a unique selling point attracting wine tourists to the cellar- door - from wine and river cruises to vintage motorcar and heritage museums.

Winner: MUSEUM VAN DE CAAB at Solms-Delta

37.27% received

 

Award for Best Food and Wine Pairing on a Wine Farm

These days cellar doors tempt wine tourists with special food and wine pairings at the cellar tasting centre - from biltong, nuts, dried fruits and wine to cheese, chocolate, and nougat and gourmet canapé tasting platters. We went looking for the best Winelands experiences in the art of food and wine pairing over the tasting counter. Note: This category excludes formal restaurant pairing menus.

Winner: Creation canapé platter pairing

34.84% received

Supernova Award

for the Klink nominee with the most votes overall

Winner: Blaauwklippen

There was even an award for the best tweet sent from the function

Excellent canapés provided by Zain Muller's Catering on Call

Tailpiece: Monika's shoes and a bottle of Laborie Brut MCC

The venue looks down over De Waterkant

© John Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus cc 2012

South China Dim Sum Bar in Long Street

After we'd tasted the great selection of White wines at Caroline's Review,

we headed up to the top of Long Street

following Sebastian and Nici Beaumont's recommendation,

to the South China Dim Sum Bar

where, perchance, we found chef/author Marlene van der Westhuizen

and her husband, Deon

A good variety and friendly prices on the menu

and a very neat little kitchen

Lynne wrote our order on a napkin to make life easy for our waitress

who was especially friendly, enthusiastic and very hard-working

After all the young white wines, nothing tastes quite as good as a beer

even if it is made from rice

dinner served in the finest bone china - what the hell, it tasted good

a short, but well-chosen and very reasonably priced wine list

The Chef is the Boss & writes the bills

in a good place for serious conversation and kung fu posters

good coffee, we're told

and very good food

© John Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2012

Caroline's White Wine Review

Caroline Rillema

RJ Botha & Jacus Marais of Nitida with Lynne

Heidi Cilliers from Villiera, watched by winemaker Christiaan Visser, pours a taste of Monro for Maggie Mostert

and Johan de Wet from Dewetshof with his friend Daniela

John and Karen Loubser of Silverthorn

Cellarmaster Johan Joubert pours a taste of Kleine Zalze

Karen van Niekerk of High Constantia pours Clos André MCC for a fan

Katie Barratt of De Morgenzon and Bruwer Raats

Platter Winery of the Year Cape Chamonix winemaker Gottfried Mocke in Halloween mood

Pierre Wahl of Rijk's

with Andrea Mullineux

Hermanuspietersfontein's Bartho Eksteen aka Drew Chigorombo

Drew Chigorombo aka Bartho Eksteen

Drew and Bartho

Vergelegen's André van Rensburg and friends

© John Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2012

1st November 2012 Main Ingredient's MENU - Computer Crash, Busy doing nothing, Dangerous food, 2013 John Platter Guide launch, Pumpkin and Red Pepper Soup with Cacao Cream, Problems cooking Venison, Events and Restaurant specials

MENU

Main Ingredient’s weekly E-Journal

Gourmet Foods, Ingredients & Fine Wines

Eat In Guide’s Outstanding Outlet Award Winner from 2006 to 2010

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 Southern double-collared sunbird hen

In this week’s MENU:

     Products

     Our market activities

     Computer Crash

     Busy, doing nothing     

     Dangerous food    

     2013 John Platter Guide launch

     Pumpkin and Red Pepper Soup with Cacao Cream

     Problems cooking Venison

     Events and Restaurant specials

     Wine courses & cooking classes

To take a look at our Main Ingredient blogs, follow the link: http://adamastorbacchus.blogspot.com/ because to tell the whole story here would take too much space. You can also click on underlined and Bold words in the text to open links to pictures, blogs, pertinent websites or more information. Follow us on Twitter: @mainingmenu

This week’s Product menu    November already. This year is disappearing far too quickly. Soon Christmas will be upon us. Lynne has made delicious Christmas puddings and mini Christmas cakes for several years and they have been very popular. Send us a message if you wish to order Chestnuts are also enjoying a sudden spurt in popularity, probably in anticipation of Christmas celebrations. We have more in stock in cans and jars, as well as chestnut purées. We expect to have marrons glacées soon. We have a small quantity of pickled walnuts, made by Yvonne Bayly whose husband Peter makes the delicious Bayly’s Port.  Have a look for these and other things you need in our Product list.

We have a lot of fun putting MENU together each week and, of course, doing the things we write about, but making it possible for you to enjoy rare and wonderful gourmet foods is what drives our business. We stock a good range of ingredients and delicious ready-made gourmet foods. You can contact us by email or phone, or through our website. We can send your requirements to you anywhere in South Africa.

Our market activities   Come and visit us at the Old Biscuit Mill’s wonderfully exciting, atmospheric Neighbourgoods Market, as always, this Saturday and every Saturday between 09h00 and 14h00. Tip: Some visitors tell us how they struggle to find parking. It’s quite easy if you know how. Click here for a map which shows where we park.

We will be back at Long Beach Mall on Friday 9th November and again on Friday 23rd from 09h00 to 16h00. We look forward to seeing you there. Please note that, in December, we will only be at Long Beach Mall on Friday the 7th, so that will be the only convenient day for Christmas shopping at the Long Beach market if you live in the “deep South”.

Computer Crash      A term that usually refers to a failure of the hard disk. In our case, it was a foot hooking round the power cable of John’s laptop – the computer he usually uses for his emails, editing photographs and almost everything. It travelled a fair distance across the room and is now dead. Hopefully the newest data, which had not been backed up, and the unanswered and unread emails can be retrieved. Until then, if we haven’t answered a message or taken other requested action, please resend and we’ll attend to you.

Events calendar.     We apologise for the bad link to our events calendar which some of you have experienced. Interestingly, it still has the highest number of hits by some margin compared with our other blogs. It has been fixed; somehow the link dropped a digit, which is why it couldn’t connect.

Busy, doing nothing      We have just had a lovely weekend, doing absolutely nothing. Our weekend starts at 4 on Saturdays when we get home from the Biscuit Mill and usually we are either rushing off somewhere special or doing some entertaining. The past few weeks have been hectic and so we were delighted to find we could just STOP for a day or two and gather ourselves together, eat some homely food and catch up on all those things you love to do when you have time at home – which includes cooking, gardening and computer games and watching recorded shows like Masterchef in all its variations on TV for Lynne and, for John, working on photos, reading and catching up on nature programmes and sport. Especially watching Western Province take the Currie Cup, which was particularly sweet because most of the pundits said they had no chance. The weekend didn’t go quite as planned....

Dangerous food      As we have said before, being in the food business can be risky - one gets to eat all sorts of interesting and unusual items, without knowing how they will affect us, or whether we will like or enjoy them and whether we will have an allergic reaction. However, this week it was something quite mundane that took Lynne out, a fresh egg from the country gave her a very nasty dose of food poisoning (it was the only thing John did not eat) and necessitated a dash to our doctor, lots of pills, potions and injections. She is fine now, if a little thinner. She thinks there might just be a better way to lose weight than this very unpleasant route. No drinking in a week that features the Platter Guide launch (where we get invited to taste all the top 5 star voted wines), The Klink Awards, Caroline’s White Wine Review and the Expressions of Swartland and Darling wine tasting and wine pairing dinner at the Taj hotel is a sacrifice and a challenge. She went to Caroline’s and will go to the last two but will have to spit when tasting wine and be very choosy about what she eats.

2013 John Platter Guide launch     Lynne’s ailment meant that John went to the Platter launch at the Vineyard unaccompanied. The 2013 guide, with a bright coral cover, has been printed in Paarl, rather than Singapore, where it has been printed for the last few years. Local, as they say, is lekker. Andrew McDowall, the publisher gave a typically amusing account of the preparation of the Guide.  In this edition, a record 62 wines earned five stars, with the winery of the year, Cape Chamonix garnering four 5 star ratings. Three cellars (Fairview, Mullineux Family and Nederburg) each earned three 5 stars, and Boschendal, Fleur du Cap, Jordan, Raka, Sadie Family and Tokara were each awarded two 5 stars.

Of the 5 star awarded wines, the reds and whites which receive the most votes from the judging panel are named Platter’s Wines of the Year. This time the Red Wine Of The Year is Mullineux Family Syrah 2010 (Wine of Origin Swartland), described in the guide as “an icon in the making”, whilst the White Wine Of The Year is Paul Cluver Noble Late Harvest 2011 (Wine of Origin Elgin), a botrytised riesling dessert wine noted as “a thing of beauty”.

In an ongoing focus on value for money, Platter's identifies a number of entry-level wines which are exceptionally drinkable and well priced. The best of these, like the 5 star candidates, go into a second round of “blind” tasting (without sight of the label) to select the Superquaffer of the Year. For the first time since 2007, the ultra-easy sipper of the year is a red wine – Melck’s Shiraz-Cabernet Sauvignon 2011 by Muratie Estate (Wine of Origin Western Cape), noted in the guide as “a model of lively drinkability”, showing “a curvaceous smoothness”.

We were especially pleased to see some of the newer and smaller producers being awarded a 5 star rating for their wines, notably, Adi Badenhorst (Secateurs), David Sadie (Lemberg) and Chris Alheit (Cartology). Particularly thrilling was seeing Christopher Keet, who made such brilliant wines at Cordoba being awarded five stars for his classically elegant second vintage First Verse 2010. The full list of five star wines appears here.

Not only did he visit the Vineyard Hotel, but also the vineyard at the Vineyard. On the bank of the Liesbeek River, in the hotel grounds, there is a small sauvignon blanc vineyard, with vines allocated to various people who are involved with wine and who are supporters of the hotel. One of these vines has our name on it and GM Roy Davies took John to visit it. You can see it and some photographs of the event here.

Do you have problems cooking Venison?     We had some beautiful venison in the freezer that needed cooking this weekend and Lynne discovered a rather interesting recipe in Nigella’s cookbook How to Eat. The venison was not springbok, we think eland or gemsbok as it was a dark and heavy meat. So marinating it in white wine with spices for 24 hours was definitely going to improve the texture. Then cooking it, nestled between layers of onions which had been almost caramelised, for 3 to 4 hours at 160°C would also seem to have been designed to tenderise it. The flavour was amazing, but the texture of the meat was like old rope. Can anyone explain why this happened? Lynne is always keen to learn and make sure this tragedy doesn’t happen again with good meat. The meat was not browned before it went into the casserole and was in plenty of stock. We would love to know.

We have previously cooked venison in various ways - marinated in port is a favourite - and we don’t like the very soft texture of the meat after it has been marinated in buttermilk and not encountered this problem before.

Checking facts   Please be assured that, where we can we always check our facts after an event, from a PR handout or disc, the internet, other research or just plain talking to the people concerned. We have had a couple of comments recently about the spelling of BISTROT for Bizerca – if you check a good French dictionary or Larousse, you will see that it is an alternative spelling for the same word. Check their web site, or the photos on our blog: that is how it is spelt and that is how the chef and his wife want it spelt. Ditto the phrase jus gras (lit. Fat juice or gravy) is well used – check the Internet and is often the oil, scrapings and meat juices from the bottom of the roasting tin and it came directly off their menu.

However we are human and mistakes, which we always try to put right, can occasionally slip through the cracks, especially because we sometimes have to write and edit and put Menu to bed in the middle of the night on Thursdays, after an event. And sometimes, just sometimes, it can happen, we are given the wrong information...

Happy Halloween to those of you who are celebrating it.

Lynne thought you might like a pumpkin recipe this week to use up the remains of yours. We haven’t tried it yet, but it sounds delicious, and fairly quick and easy.

Pumpkin and Red Pepper Soup with Cacao Cream from Willie Harcourt-Couze’s cookbook Willie’s Chocolate Factory.

2 Kg pumpkin or butternut, coarsely chopped and peeled – 2 t fresh rosemary, chopped - 80m extra virgin olive oil – 2 red peppers, halved, seeds removed – 2 large onions, roughly chopped – 4 garlic cloves, crushed – 1 litre vegetable or chicken stock – 50 g cacao finely grated (good dark bitter chocolate, over 70% cocoa mass) – crème fraiche to finish – cocoa nibs to finish (not essential - you can grate over some more dark chocolate)

Preheat the oven to 220°C (fan) Place the pumpkin in a large roasting tray, top with the rosemary and drizzle over half the oil. Season with salt and grated black pepper then roast for 30 minutes or until tender. Halfway through add the red pepper halves, cut side down on a lightly oiled roasting tray. Meanwhile heat the remaining oil in a large saucepan over a medium heat and fry the onion and garlic until soft. Take the pumpkin and peppers from the oven. Put the peppers in a plastic bag, seal and leave to steam and cool, this will make it easier to peel them.

Add the pumpkin to the onion and garlic with the enough of the stock to cover and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Peel and chop the peppers and add them to the soup. Liquidise or blitz till smooth. Adjust the seasoning and stir in the cacao or chocolate. Ladle the soup into bowls and finish with a spoonful of crème fraiche and a scattering of cacoa nibs or grating of chocolate.

TREKKING FOR TRASH     If you want to smile and be amazed at what Proudly South African people are doing in this country for the environment and communities - check out this wonderful website http://www.facebook.com/TrekkingForTrash From now on we will always take a rubbish bag when we go for a walk on the beach and put what we can into our recycling. What a great initiative by Michael and Camilla.

Superior Pots & Pans     One of our readers has a glorious 22-piece set of genuine, old, heavyweight copper pots which she wants to sell. They are lined and in first-class condition. She is looking for R22,000 for the set. If yowould like to see them she can send you a photograph. We had it, but it’s in the crashed computer. Contact MaaDee at: 021 685 9329, 073 526 2474, or sparki@holotropic.co.za

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 month for which we have information. To help you choose an event to visit, click on our Events Calendar. All the events are listed in date order and we already have a large number of exciting events to entertain you right through the year. Click here to access the Calendar. You will need to be connected to the internet.

Learn about wine and cooking We have had 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 here.

Chez Gourmet in Claremont has a programme of cooking classes. A calendar of their classes can be seen here. Pete Ayub, who makes our very popular Prego sauce, runs evening cooking classes at Sense of Taste, his catering company in Maitland. We can recommend them very highly, having enjoyed his seafood course. Check his programme here. Nadège Lepoittevin-Dasse has cooking classes in Fish Hoek and conducts cooking tours to Normandy. You can see more details here.

Restaurant Special offers. Some more restaurants have responded to our request for an update of their special offers and we have, therefore, updated our list of restaurant special offers. Click here to access it. These Specials have been sent to us by the restaurants or their PR agencies. We have not personally tried all of them and their listing here should not always be taken as a recommendation from ourselves. If they don’t update us, we can’t be responsible for any inaccuracies in the list. When we have tried it, we’ve put in our observations. We have cut out the flowery adjectives etc. that so many have sent, to give you the essentials. Click on the name to access the relevant website. All communication should be with the individual restaurants.

1st November 2012

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 product list for details and prices.

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

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 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 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.

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 and keep our mailing list strictly confidential. 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 message.