A tour to Darling

We'd made appointments with Ormonde, Charles Withington in his lovely Darling Wine Shop and Groote Post. Leaving the harbour at about 9 am, we reached Ormonde about an hour later. Zia du Toit, the marketing manager met us and introduced us to Adré Rheeder who took us into the vienyards.

Ormonde General Manager Adré Rheeder talks about the terroir of the farm

We tasted the Alexanderfontein, Ondine and Ormonde wines with chocolates made to suit the wines 

Marketing Manager Zia du Toit led the tasting

After this great experience, we paid a visit to Charles Withington

at the Darling Wine Shop

who gave us some of his own wines to taste and his 7 year old potstill brandy. 

From there, we moved to Groote Post for lunch at Hilda's Kitchen in the old Groote Post manor house

A starter plate of Darling charcuterie

Salmon trout salad

Mushroom quiche, another choice as starter

A seafood pie, made with kingklip, mussels and calamari

The Old Man's steak roll served with garlic crème and hand cut chips was chosen by two of us. It was so good that John tucked in before he remembered to take a picture. It was delicious, the meat being well-matured, full-flavoured and very tender, served medium rare

After lunch, we moved to the winery for a tasting with Wimpie Borman. As we walked in, we were surprised to see Lukas Wentzel, the winemaker. As it was mid-harvest, we did not expect to see him, but he interrupted his busy schedule to give us a taste of the fermenting semillon and sauvignon blanc from the tank,

after which Wimpie led us through the range of Groote Post wines

Groote Post is not only a wine farm. Peter Pentz, the owner, is a dairy farmer who also grows wine with his son Nicholas. A large part of the farm is a nature conservancy, with a good number of animals living in a natural environment. Wimpie took is in their safari vehicle 

for a tour of the farm

They have a breeding herd of quagga. These are  a subspecies of the Plains Zebra (Equus Quagga) which does not have stripes on its rear quarters. It became extinct through excessive hunting in the 19th century. It is being revived through selective breeding and there is a small herd on Groote Post

as well as other animals such as eland, wildebeest, springbok and oryx

After the tour, we hit the road for Cape Town harbour and the ship, with a cheery farewell from Nick Pentz and Lukas Wentzel

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

Thelema wine trade tasting at Dear Me

This was held at Dear Me restaurant in Longmarket Street on Tuesday, 1st April and we tasted through the entire range of Sutherland and Thelema wines. They have some absolute crackers and you will be if you don’t source some of them soon before they sell out. The Thelema 2012 Chardonnay is already sold out although there may be some in good wine shops and you will certainly find in on good wine lists at good restaurants. We think the Thelema Shiraz may well win awards; the Merlot 2010 is probably the best Merlot  we have tasted this year, soft, fruity, with no stalky green notes, and no lactic either. The Thelema Cabernet Sauvigon 2009 is an absolute classic, full of all the forest floor and dark berries one expects. The Mint Cabernet is also one to try, different and good with food, we think, lots of chocolate and mint flavours.. The mint is a characteristic we have always found in Thelema cabs. The Sutherland Viogner Roussanne is excellent, the Sauvignon Blanc a lovely example of what Elgin grapes can do. 

The interior of the restaurant

Welcomed by a glass of a Thelema classic - their 1994 Blanc de Blanc MCC. We had a good bottle, very rich and full of elegant notes of citrus

The trade loves tasting and discussing wine

The Thelema Sutherland wines are distributed by John Collins, seen here with Kyle Martin, one of his representatives

Marketing man Thomas Webb  and Diaan van Zyl

Amanda Visser  wearing the Thelema symbol of the phoenix rising from the fire

Thelema owner and cellarmaster Giles Webb

A stairway to madness?

The menu for Dear Me, photographed by the door under streetlights

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

140326 Main Ingredient's MENU - Vrede and Lust, Laborie, ATKV Oesfees, Cellarbake@Nitida, SASSI Chefs, Mt Nelson Dinner, Anchovy & Herb sauce

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Cape Sugarbird (Promerops cafer)

Lynne says we use too many pictures of birds, but John liked this - taken at Constantia Glen yesterday (they were very active and made a lot of noise) and we do prefer to use photographs taken within the week

In this week’s MENU:

 Vrede and Lust Lunch

 Laborie Lazy Days

 ATKV Oesfees at Solms Delta

 Cellarbake@Nitida

 SASSI Seafood Circle of Chefs

 Wine & Dine Dinner at the Mount Nelson

 Anchovy and Herb sauce

This week’s Product menu - Winter seems to be making a very early return and people seem to be thinking of stews and casserole and soups. Dont forget about our good range of stock cubes, granules and French mustards, all of which help to flavour food.  A dollop of good grainy mustard in a beef stew will really light it up.

If you can find it in the supermarket, we don't usually stock it, just the products you would struggle to find.... Check our online shop to see more details and prices.

Vrede and Lust Lunch      We attended an interesting tasting of all the white wines from this lovely farm on the edge of Franschhoek last Thursday and it was accompanied by a really delicious lunch in Lust, their restaurant. Not only did chef JP Smith cook great food, but we discovered that he is a master baker and the bread he produces is quite superb. We were lucky enough to be given a loaf to bring home and are now sad that they are so far away for when we want more. Next time you are passing, go and taste the excellent wines and the food and buy some bread to take home. Click here to see the photographs.

Laborie Lazy Days      Would you like to completely pamper someone you love? Then take them for a break to Laborie in beautiful Paarl for a night or two. The room rate for one of their rooms starts at a very reasonable R585 pp with a huge breakfast served in the Manor House. See their website You can be welcomed by a bottle of their superb Blanc de Blanc bubbly (R110) on the terrace outside your suite. You can eat lunch at Harvest Restaurant on their terrace or dinner inside with soft candlelight and prices are reasonable. You can do a wine and chocolate pairing in the tasting room at R40 for three different wines paired with chocolate, or a charcuterie and cheese lunch on the lawn for R140 under the trees. And you can come home with boxes of wine at very reasonable prices. How do we know? We were invited there and were thoroughly spoilt for two days last week, doing all the above. Click here to see all the pictures.

ATKV Oesfees at Solms Delta      This wonderful, very real Harvest Festival is a joy of music and laughter, great local food, and Solms Delta wine. The workers of Franschhoek mingle and have fun together with the paying public and It gives one such a lift to see how SA really does join together to celebrate a harvest, hard work and the future with exciting local music and food. There is such real South African Gees. We took our Dutch friends and they absolutely loved the event, as did we. Click here to see the photographs

Cellarbake@Nitida     At last, a new and innovative way to showcase wine, this time with cakes, desserts and other baked goods. You bought an elegant champagne flute and five tokens for R100 and you could do five pairings of wine with a small tasting portion of cake, tart, pie etc. We had one each and we shared the 10 tastings, but you could buy more tokens and taste everything and you could buy full sized portions of cakes, tarts, puddings, cookies, bread or ice creams to enjoy with a glass of wine. Well known top artisanal bakers gathered from around the Cape to showcase their signature dishes, paired perfectly by culinary connoisseur and Cellarbake Wine Consultant Michael Olivier, with Nitida and Môreson wines. You could also do a huge high tea for only R165.  Make a note for your diary next year, we do hope this successful event happens again. Nitida owners and founders of Cellarbake, Peta and Bernhard Veller were thrilled that Cellarbake@Nitida was received so well by all who were in search of something satisfyingly new and they look forward to its growth and development as an annual festival. We know that Tamsin Snyman worked very hard to get the best bakers to work at the festival.  Have a look at it here

SASSI Seafood Circle of Chefs     Take a remarkable turnout of top chefs from around the country, a good turnout of restaurateurs, wine people and media and an evening of absolutely appalling wet and unseasonally cold weather at Harbour House in the Waterfront and what do you have? A hugely successful evening despite non-stop rain and wind.. Luckily, there was plenty of shelter on the terrace while scrolls were awarded to chefs who are making great choices using sustainable fish from the WWF-SASSI Green list. We drank good wines and Harbour house produced some great dishes and sushi using the same sustainable fish. Click here to see more of the event.

Wine & Dine Dinner at the Mount Nelson on Thursday     Just to remind you that there is going to be another of these great dinners, this time pairing Môreson’s wines with talented chef Rudi Liebenberg’s food this Friday, the 28th March. There is still a little space, so get your booking done today. How does Hot Smoked Monkfish on a squid ink and Prawn risotto paired with Môreson Mercator Chardonnay appeal to you? Or Nut and Seed crusted Venison with Môreson Pinotage? Yum

This week’s recipe     Inspired by Sassi’s Green list, Lynne wanted to give you a recipe using Anchovies and this is the perfect sauce to serve with any fish or seafood dish. You might be astounded to know that it is also sensational if spread on a leg of lamb before roasting. Just use a little less olive oil so the paste is a little drier and easy to spread. It also goes well with veal cutlets and if you add some walnuts, you can turn this into a pesto. If you have some over add to fresh butter, roll up and freeze to use rounds on steak.

Anchovy and Herb sauce

12 anchovy fillets in oil, drained - 2 T Extra virgin olive oil – 2 large handfuls of flat parsley, roughly chopped – 2 T fresh thyme leaves - 3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed – freshly milled black pepper – 2 T good balsamic vinegar

Blitz in a blender till you have a good green sauce with a little texture. Store in the fridge and use within a day or two. You can add a chilli if you want to spice this up a bit.

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. Karen Glanfield has taken over the UnWined wine appreciation courses from Cathy. See the details 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

26th March 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.

SASSI Seafood Circle of Chefs at Harbour House

Take a remarkable turnout of top chefs from around the country, a good turnout of restaurateurs, wine people and media and an evening of absolutely appalling wet and unseasonally cold weather at Harbour House in the Waterfront and what do you have?  A hugely successful evening despite non-stop rain and wind. Luckily there was plenty of shelter on the terrace while scrolls were awarded to chefs who are making great choices using sustainable fish from the WWF-SASSI Green list. We drank good wines and Harbour House produced some great dishes and sushi using the same sustainable fish.

Snoek paté and tuna brochette

The chefs gather

Janine Basson  introduces the Sassi awards

Chef Geoffrey Murray from Pezula in Knysna was a recipient of an award

André Nel, Pick n Pay’s General Manager for Sustainability

Chef Jackie Cameron had travelled all the way from the Natal Midlands to receive her award. She told us why she is so committed to using only SASSI green listed fish

Relaxing and listening while hearing about SASSI

Executive chefs Rudi Liebenberg of the Mount Nelson and Jackie Cameron of Hartford House in the Natal Midlands

Our closest neighbours, Mari and Chef Henry Vigar from La Mouette in Sea Point

Rudi Liebenberg and Executive chef Christiaan Campbell of Delaire Graff

A convocation of chefs: Jackie Cameron, Gregory Czarnecki, Christiaan Campbell, Mrs Campbell, Leigh Trout

The Waterfront harbour on a damp night

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014