Lunch with Saronsberg wines at the Cape Grace

Saronsberg’s winemaker Dewaldt Heyns welcomes us with their crisp and delightful MCC Brut 2009, a blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir

This is what we do for a living... well, some of us

The Brut MCC, showing some of the prestigious awards it has received.

We begin the tasting and the tweeting ..

... and the conversation, while the Restaurant Manager, Martin Drotsky, and PRO Nicolette Waterford pour the wines

Dewaldt is extremely knowledgeable about his wines and his terroir and his soils and explained what they are trying to achieve in a very interesting way.

The line up of wines we tasted

Winemaker Dewaldt Heyns with Mariette and Nick van Huysteen, the owners of Saronsberg

We then moved into the Signal restaurant for lunch

Correct glasses for the tasting and some gifts to take home afterwards

The menu and the wines the courses were paired with

One of the wines we especially loved was the Shiraz rosé, which tastes just like a ripe red plum with savoury notes. This pairing of the ripe tomato, baby beets and strawberry sorbet completely echoed that wine and was a brilliant pairing. Tomato is notoriously hard to pair with wine, this is a real find AND is only R45 a bottle on the farm. This dish was originally going to be the starter for the vegetarians among us, but was so successful that they served it to everyone, together with the Smoked salmon trout and prawn starter. That went superbly with the Viognier which is elegant and restrained and not overfull or over wooded.

Mike Bampfield Duggan and Nick van Huysteen enjoying lunch with other members of the media

The main course of tender Chalmar sirloin in a good rich jus and roasted figs went so well with the beautifully made savoury Grenache 2011. The other good wine paired with this course was the Full Circle 2011 which is a Michelangelo Platinum award winning Rhône blend of Shiraz, Grenache, Mourvedre and a soupçon of Viognier and is made to go with meat dishes like this.

Shanté Hutton Of Wine.co.za chats to Christian Eedes

So nice to have the wines served in the correct glasses. It does make a huge difference

Dessert was a poem of textures and flavours. The crisp cream filled choux bun with a crunchy coating was stuffed full with white chocolate cheesecake and accompanied by a nicely balanced slightly sour peach and vanilla paste with a dollop of burnt honey ice cream. Served with the epic 2006Six Point Three straw wines it echoed all those flavours and the wine added more of the same flavours and sweetness the each mouthful. The exciting Brut 2010 was a good counterpoint to the dish, taking away any cloying richness with its crisp beady full palate. 

All in all it was a pretty damned fine tasting and meal with some great wines. Thank you Dewaldt, Saronsberg and Cape Grace chefs.

Return to MENU

© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

Franschhoek Summer Wines at Leopard's Leap

This very modern winery is situated on the main road into Franschhoek and this building contains the stylish tasting room, a shop selling modern kitchen equipment and accessories and the large restaurant and open kitchen where they also hold cookery lessons.

The different wine farms' stalls were all set up on the lawn under umbrellas, with seats and umbrellas in the middle. Suited for summer drinking, most of the wines were white, with a couple of rosés and some good MCC bubblies.  We tasted Sauvignon Blancs, Semillons, Chenins, Viognier, Chardonnays, several blends and Terra del Capo's good Pinot Grigio.  We particularly liked La Bri’s Chardonnay, so well made by Irene Waller, Haute Cabrières Belle Rose and Morena’s Brut Rosé. The standard of wines was very high and most were eminently drinkable, nay quaffable.

The chef on the left is Granville Riffel from Franschhoek and told Lynne he is Reuben Riffel's cousin. He works under  Head Chef  Pieter de Jager. Their pastry chef had lots of dessert delights on offer to tempt us.

Lunch was a serve yourself salad buffet and your plate was weighed to gauge the cost. We had a Moroccan chickpea couscous salad topped with a hot harissa, an artichoke and egg mixed salad, a potato salad, beetroot, beans and many more. If you didn’t eat meat you were fine, you just didn’t add any at the end

Then you could add a large slice of this magnificent crisp rotisserie pork, or some barbecue chicken. And there was apple sauce and other accoutrements to go with the salads and the chicken.

Our first bubby of the day was the MCC from Morena, lovely and crisp and lively

Lots of enthusiastic festival goers queued to taste it

La Motte offers the best selling sauvignon Blanc in South Africa from the farm next door

Takuan von Arnim showing the delicious Haute Cabrière Belle Rose

Lizelle Gerber, Boschendal's white wine maker, with their Brut Rosé

Ghenwa and Geza Steingaszner with Kevin Swart of Black Elephant Vintners and his wife

BE Vintners winemaker Jacques Wentzel with Barbara Swanepoel and her daughter

Anelle van Tonder of Babylonstoren

A band played Springsteen, rock, pop and other oldies

Great seating on the cool shaded and misted terrace and the queue for the buffet behind.  Everyone seemed to eat lunch; the queue went on for ages but was reasonably quick.

There were also some good chilling areas if you wanted a rest from tasting

The spacious lawn gave the large number of visitors plenty of room and no one felt crowded

Two English visitors, escaping the British winter with a glass of Leopard's Leap bubbly

poured by Lillian Jonker and Stian Willemse

Return to MENU
© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

IWSC tasting at the Grande Roche in Paarl

The International Wine & Spirit Competition is an annual wine competition founded in 1969 by the [German/British] oenologist Anton Massel. He had the idea of creating a competition which was based not just on organoleptic judgement, but where all entries also had to undergo chemical analysis. A set of technical controls was implemented in order to ensure that the highest quality standards were achieved and maintained year after year

The IWSC receives entries from nearly 90 countries worldwide. No matter where the entry originates, whether it is youthful or aged, it is judged according to its class and treated with respect and consideration. The awards given by the competition are considered as high honours in the industry.  The event occurs annually in November, in London

Chief South African Judge Dave Hughes with Maryna Strachan, who is the local IWSC representative and Michela Nassiz, the international representative, explains to us how the competition works 

The eminent Mr Hughes always prefers informal attire

The large crowd of winemakers, growers, wine trade and media listens to the speeches

One gold and three silver MCC winners of the international competition were indeed available for tasting, Grande Roche’s labels misleading everyone

It was agreed that the venue was too small for the very large amount of interest the wines received and tasting did become a bit of a scrum at times.  The white wines were on the right hand side of the table and the many reds were  on the left.  Sweet wines were on another table at the end of the room and brandies and whiskies had another table on the opposite side of this one

Lots of informed tasting and note taking and, of course, lots on conjecture as always when competition wines are being tasted

A selection of dessert wines being kept cool

Return to MENU
© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

140206 Main Ingredient's MENU - Being Green, Breedekloof Dinner, Stellenbosch Wine Festival, Cape Talk’s Bandstand Boogaloo, Fresh Tomato and Basil Soup

MENU

Main Ingredient’s weekly E-Journal

Gourmet Foods & Ingredients

Eat In Guide’s Five time Outstanding Outlet Award Winner

www.mainingredient.biz - http://www.adamastorphotos.com/

Follow our blogs at http://www.adamastorbacchus.com/

+27 21 439 3169 / +27 83 229 1172

Click here to Subscribe to MENU or to contact us

Follow us on Twitter: @mainingmenu

Cormorants - home time

In this week’s MENU:

 Being Green

 Breedekloof Dinner at Cullinan Hotel

 Stellenbosch Wine Festival

 Cape Talk’s Bandstand Boogaloo

 This week’s recipe:  Fresh Tomato and Basil Soup

Change in the way we present MENU Thank you to all who gave us feedback about the way we are presenting MENU. One pertinent comment was that it was not easy to go back to MENU after reading one of the blogs. We have inserted a "Return to MENU" link at the bottom of each of the related story blogs and it will take you back to the blog version of MENU

This week’s Product menu - Our product of the week is Protea Hill Farm's Balsamic Raspberry vinegar, which is an essential ingredient for this week’s soup. It comes from Stellenbosch, is completely organically grown and made and you can have a two year old for R90 or a balsamic which has been matured in a barrel for more than 10 years for R150 for 250ml. If you don’t want to use this, we can sell you a very good Italian red wine vinegar for R30 a bottle. There is also white wine vinegar in our range and several French vinegars and Spanish sherry vinegars. Check our online shop to see more details and prices.

This has been a week of very large events and some awful heat. We measured 43.5ºC when we left the Stellenbosch Wine Festival at about 3pm on Friday and our car thermometer read 45ºC as we parked under a tree outside our house in upper Sea Point on getting home. We always thought Stellenbosch would be hotter than Sea Point!

Being Green      We are busy putting up sun foil in our sea facing windows (Our house, built in 1924, is called Sunkissed) and it is making a lot of difference with internal house temperatures. We hope this also helps to keep the warmth in next winter as we heat our house only using our wood burning stove and we hate to think we are also contributing to global warming by heating some of Sea Point and surrounds.

Breedekloof Dinner at Cullinan Hotel     We have come to appreciate some of the wines of this area since our visit to Slanghoek in December Slanghoek is a ward of this wine district. We must confess that the wine we tasted at this function last year was not universally good so click here to see if we have changed our opinions of it and the food we were served

Stellenbosch Wine Festival     This was held over the last weekend and we do hope many of you ventured out there despite the heat. Luckily Saturday and Sunday were much cooler. We were invited to the media launch at 11 so click here to see what we experienced.

Cape Talk Radio’s Bandstand Boogaloo at Greenways Hotel      This wonderful outdoor music event was held last Saturday night and we had a great deal of fun. If you wish you had gone or want to attend another of their events in future, read here

This week’s recipe:  Fresh Tomato and Basil Soup

When the weather is hot, one does not want to eat a lot and a cold fresh soup often makes life bearable. They are usually very easy to make using in a blender or food processor and often don’t require any cooking

We have a lot of basil growing in our vertical garden and some nice tomatoes. This is nearly all you need to make a really lovely summer soup very quickly.

1/3 cup of basil – 250 ml good extra virgin olive oil - 2 kg of really ripe tomatoes – a large clove of garlic - 1 T of Protea Hill Farm raspberry vinegar (or red wine vinegar) – Salt & freshly ground black pepper - Optional one or two teaspoons of sugar

Blitz the fresh basil with the olive oil and leave in the fridge till you need it.

Cut a small cross in each of the tomatoes using a very sharp knife. Put them into a large bowl (you may have to do two batches according to how large your tomatoes are) and cover with boiling water. Leave for 3 to 4 minutes, then drain and plunge them into ice cold water. This will make them easy to peel. Peel them and roughly chop. Remove the core if it is large.

 If you want to leave the skins on, begin here. The soup will be a little more grainy.

Put the tomatoes into a blender or food processor and blitz with the peeled garlic clove until smooth. You can also do this in batches. Add salt and pepper and the Raspberry or red wine vinegar to the puree. Taste and adjust seasoning. If your tomatoes were not completely ripe, you might want to add a little sugar at this stage.

Serve chilled in large bowls and then drizzle a circle of green basil oil on the top of each bowl. Enjoy with crusty bread. If you want to spice this up, add a fresh chilli. If you want it creamy, add some ripe avocado.

Wines we enjoyed this week Most of the wines we have tasted this week have been at the various tastings we have attended. Undoubtedly, the best has been the 5 star Opstal Carl Everson Chenin, more about which in the Breedekloof story above. Our wine club had a tasting last night in which South African and comparable International wines were tasted in the appropriate Riedel glasses, but time constraints mean that we will give you details next week. Wines of note at the Stellenbosch Festival were the Ken Forrester Reserve Chenin, very close in quality to his famed FMC at a far more affordable price, Idiom's Merlot Pinotage Cabernet Petit Verdot blend (that's what they call it) and Journey's End Destination Chardonnay, a big wine with a good balance of wood and fruit, which will be a good accompaniment to a dish like pan-fried pork cutlets. At home, we have enjoyed Babylon's Peak Shiraz Carignan 2009, which we ordered from the farm after it won a double gold (best Rhône-style blend) at the 2011 Veritas show. Price then a remarkable R45 per bottle. It has a lovely blend of fruit and spice, with a bone-dry but savoury finish

Buying from us On Line 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 on line shop. We can send your requirements to you anywhere in South Africa. Please do not pay until we have confirmed availability and invoiced you, then you pay and then we deliver or post. When you make an eft payment, make sure that it says who you are. Use the form on the website to email us your order. Click here to see our OnLine Shop.

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 see what’s happening in our world of food and wine (and a few other cultural events), visit 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. 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.

Chez Gourmet in Claremont has a programme of cooking classes. A calendar of their classes can be seen here. Nadège Lepoittevin-Dasse has cooking classes in Fish Hoek 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. Brett Nussey’s Stir Crazy courses are now being run from Dish Food and Social’s premises in Main Road Observatory (opposite Groote Schuur hospital). 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 Wednesday evenings. She trained with Raymond Blanc, and has been a professional chef for 25 years. More info here

6th February 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.

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 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.

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. We own our mailing software 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.