Old Mutual Trophy Awards lunch and awards presentation at the Mount Nelson's Planet restaurant

This was a huge success and we congratulate all the winners and the organisers. We love being there and seeing who has been invited, because that inevitably means that they have won something good; a Gold Medal or a Trophy. There were some very new faces there this year and there were some very familiar faces. KWV deservedly took the prestigious Fairbairn Capital trophy for the most successful producer overall, Adam Mason and Mulderbosch took the trophy for the best White wine overall and the Miele Trophy for the best Chardonnay, plus the International Judges’ Trophy. The Trophy for the best red wine overall and the Trophy for the best Shiraz, rather surprisingly, went to Mount Sutherland Super Single Vineyard Syrah 2010. Daniël de Waal grows this on the slopes of the high Sneeuwberg montains, in conditions more European than African. Another trophy went to a winery which, honestly, not many people at the awards had heard of: The trophy for the Discovery of the show went to Baleia Bay Chardonnay 2013, near St Sebastian Bay and made by Jan-Hendrick Joubert – we can’t wait to taste these wines. Click here for the full list of Gold Medal and Trophy winners. The venue was the Planet restaurant at the Mount Nelson, eminently suitable for such a large host and they ably and professionally took care of us all. We had a lovely lunch and got to enjoy some of the wines entered in the completion with our meal.

If you want to taste some of them you can attend the Old Mutual Public tastings in Cape Town at CTICC on 6th June and in Sandton Johannesburg on Thurs 12th June. Book at Computicket

Assembling in the lounge before the awards and looking to see which wine makers have been invited to receive awards

Executive Chef Rudi Liebenberg came up trumps – these lovely canapés are on the seed biscuit bases in the Banting diet. And the small beef rolls also have no carbohydrates. They both tasted really good.

And yes, some of us did eat just the smoked salmon off the bread base and avoided the tiny vol au vents.

A lovely selection to go with a welcoming glass of bubbly

Alan Cawdry of sponsor American Express gives a gallant welcome to Sarah Papenfus of WoSA

A winning table: Etienne Louw of Altydgedacht, Elona Hesseling of WineLand, Kobus van der Merwe of Laborie, Annemi Nel of De Krans, Jan Laubscher, and Izele van Blerk of KWV

Dr Winnie Bowman MW at our table with Lynne, in deep discussion with Gottfried Mocke of Chamonix. The Planet restaurant comfortably seated everyone

Samarie Smith of Die Burger and Winemaker Miles Mossop, who won a Gold Medal for his own wine, Kika, a natural Sweet Chenin Blanc

Convenor and Show Chairman Michael Fridjhon announcing the awards

Mokaedi Dilotsotlhe, General Marketing Manager of Old Mutual talking about the awards and their sponsorship

Gottfried Mocke, winemaker at Chamonix wines, at our table, won the best Museum Class Chardonnay Trophy for his Reserve Chardonnay 2008

Old Mutual Trophy Judge JD Pretorius of Steenberg collected the Grand Roche Trophy for the best White Blend for Steenberg’s Magna Carta Sauvignon Blanc/Semillon 2011. Judges' scores of their own wines are not counted. All wines are tasted blind.

Reg Holder of Delheim collected the Trophy for the best Noble Late Harvest for Delheim’s Edelspatz NLH 2013

 The menu had several choices

The starter of fresh Tuna Carpaccio with Babaganoush quenelles and avocado was substantial, meaty and very satisfying. We had this with the Stellenrust Barrel Fermented Chenin Blanc, a classic full on Chenin, which went very well with the tuna. It scored 85 for a Silver medal

David Sonnenberg of Diemersfontein and Alan Mullins collecting the Award for Diemersfontein Woolworths Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve 2011

The first award for KWV; there would be several others. Receiving it was winemaker Izele van Blerk

Miles Mossop getting his Gold award for Kika

Razvan Macici accepting the gold award for the Nederburg Private Bin D234 Sauvignon Blanc 2011, made by Tariro Masayiti, now at Springfontein near Stanford 

David Sonnenberg of Diemersfontein wines, who won a gold medal for the Woolworths Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve 2011 with Gail Alswang, celebrating with a glass of something fine..

The main course of beautifully, oh so tender and flavourful, beef topped with a spicy empanada and lots of vegetable. The mushroom crust was a little indigestible, being more a bread stuffing than a crust

One of the superb organisers of these shows, Alex Mason-Gordon, deservedly taking a break with John Skotnes (crafter of the trophies) who looks very relaxed

RJ Botha of Kleine Zalze looking happy about the Gold Medal for their Family Reserve Chenin Blanc 2013

and Razvan accepts another award to Nederburg who won the Best Natural Sweet Dessert Wine Trophy for the Eminence Noble Late Harvest Muscadel 2011. We had some of this super wine with dessert and it is epic. Full of honey and sunshine, flowers and good fruit acids to balance the high sugars. 

Miles Mossop awarding the Tony Mossop Trophy to Annemi Nel of De Krans for the best Cape Port

André van Rensburg accepting the Trophy for the best museum class white blend for the Vergelegen ‘White’ 2009

Alex Mason-Gordon organising the awarding of the trophies 

Winners all. Gottfried Mocke of Chamonix, Brad Paton of Buitenverwachting who won a gold for Christine 2009, and JD Pretorius of Steenberg

Another Trophy for KWV being accepted by KWV winemaker Izele van Blerk and Laborie winemaker Kobus van der Merwe

The three Trophy winners who were at our small table. Young, illustrious and very good company

Dessert was a Pear frangipane with praline ice cream and an amaretto anglaise topped with a langue de chat biscuit. It went perfectly with the Nederburg NLH, but what wouldn't?

Nederburg also won the Riedel Trophy for the best Bordeaux style red blend with The Brewmaster 2010. Outsorceress Janice Fridjhon celebrates with Razvan Macici

One huge surprise was the Trophy for the Best Sparkling Wine going to The Table Bay MCC Non Vintage Blanc de Blanc, sourced by Mark Norrish for Ultra Liquors from a mystery farm in Robertson. He will not reveal its source. 

Alan Mullins CWM, very proud that three wines he had selected for Woolworths Reserve range received Gold medals: Radford Dale Syrah 2012; Spier The Hutton Cabernet Sauvignon 2012 and Diemersfontein Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve 2011

The obligatory group shot of all the Trophy and Gold Medal winners

That is quite a cache of trophies!

Kobus van der Merwe returning to KWV to show everyone the awards they earned. Apparently there was quite a celebration

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

Food Hospitality World exhibition at the CTICC

Food Trade Exhibition time. We started with a visit on Thursday morning last week to Hostex at CTICC which, sadly for us, was very much a non-event this year – too many bed companies and garden furniture. Things were much more interesting on Tuesday at another trade show, the Food Hospitality World Africa 2014, featuring more food oriented companies with some of our best producers like Fynbos Fine foods, Pesto Princess and Indezi cheeses, some of whom will follow through to the Good Food and Wine Show this weekend. And we were able to meet and congratulate Emma Dean, the winner of Masterchef Australia with her husband, who was walking through the show. A charming couple. Lynne has been following the various Masterchef programmes and still has about four of the Australian programmes to watch on PVR. She didn’t know who the winner was until she opened the newspaper that morning, which gave the game away.

The Food Hospitality World is organised by the same Italian company that now owns The Good Food and Wine show

We were delighted to find the Pesto Princess stand with their excellent products. We were next to them at the Neighbourgoods Market in the Old Biscuit Mill. Sadly, we have both stopped selling at the market. They will carry through to the Good Food and Wine show this weekend.

And our favourite Chilli products company, who supplied us from the beginning when we had our shop. Rozelle and Julian Abramson of Fynbos Fine foods are demonstrating the full range of their products and their excellent rebranding.

We were delighted to meet Rob Cornell and Paul Nash from Indezi River Cheeses in Natal. We have loved their cheeses for many years, especially their blue cheese, and were very interested to taste some of their new cheeses and to hear of their new move into many different goat cheeses, which will be on the market soon. At the moment the goats are kidding and there is no milk for cheese until the baby goats are weaned.

There was also a number of Italian suppliers exhibiting their wares. They showed us the good Italian wines they are importing into South Africa. We tasted some superb Parma hams, mortadella sausages, salamis and cheese and had a small taste of some really good Italian gelato. Lynne tasted some real pistachio and a sour cherry ice cream – there is nothing of this quality available here at the moment. We do hope they will find importers who will work with them, as many of these products are exactly what we need to help raise the standards of the local commercial produce. The artisanal producers here are doing very well but the big boys are turning out horrible quality. There was one local stand showing polony and horribly coloured frankfurters which, quite frankly, we wouldn’t touch with a bargepole.

Roberto Bottega of Idiom and Whalehaven wines showed us the extensive range of Italian wines his family is importing

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

Three Waterfront restaurants

Have you ever fantasised about having a starter in one restaurant, mains in another and dessert in a third?  Well, it is not usually available but on Tuesday, Annette Ashley, who handles the marketing for these three restaurants in the V&A Waterfront,  owned by Peter Protoulis, wanted to show us their scope and what better way than to do exactly this. We began at the Greek Fisherman and, even though the day was becoming dank and chill, sat in the open air section with a lovely view of the waterfront and the mountain, an enormous plate of Mezze to share and a good glass of  Simonsig Chenin  MORE

The Greek Fisherman’s comprehensive menu on display

The comfortable interior

The amazing mezze platter included three dips: taramasalata, humus,and tzatziki, very good hot haloumi, spanakopita (cheese pies), quince jelly, lamb koftes, tomato & mozzarella bruscetta, huge chips and some pita bread. We also had a lovely Greek salad topped with Feta cheese, and some great mussels in a tomato sauce.  It was enough for a meal on itself!

The properly dressed classic Greek salad

A sunny interlude, mezze and a dock full of boats brought back memories of dockside eating in Greece, if a little warmer.

On to the second restaurant, conveniently next door, The City Grill

Warm African animal skin polar fleece blankets became necessary as the afternoon wore on

Lamb chops for a Banting Lynne

A mustard sauce topped a large piece of medium rare sirloin for John with a glass of Simonsig Pinotage

and a plate of veal with rice and vegetables for Annette

The inside of The City Grill also has touches of Africa

Then it was up one flight of stairs to Meloncino, which has the best view of the harbour and the mountain.  One of our favourite dishes there is a marvellous Seafood pasta cooked in a paper parcel.

Here we sat inside, in comfort

The cocktail bar

The view from our table of a damp, wintry Cape Town. In summer, we bring our friends from overseas here for the excellent Italian food and the view

Lynne and Annette enjoying the day

A chocolate ice

A perfect Pannacotta with a strawberry coulis, light and creamy

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

Birthday lunch at Jardine on Jordan

Saturday saw us driving to Stellenbosch Kloof to visit one of our favourite restaurants for daughter Clare’s birthday celebration. While we started out with the best intentions, unfortunately and regrettably Banting went out of the window. We had a superb lunch, even though we castigated ourselves severely and suffered afterwards for falling for the carbs, but who can pass up fat crisp hand-cut chips, a chocolate marquise or a honey and poppy seed soufflé ? Oh, and did we mention the two warm, freshly baked breads, and hot mini vetkoek? Well, one day off can’t do too much harm can it? 

A very wet day, so behind glass near the fire ...

... but still with a beautiful view of the lake and the autumnal vines on the hill

A nice gas fire keeps the restaurant very warm

Decisions, decisions

John ventured out into the rain for a photograph

The restaurant was almost full when we arrived at 12.30 and, as usual, it pumped

The menu always has good choices for every kind of eating

A glass of Jordan’s fine unwooded Chardonnay for Lynne and one of The Outlier Sauvignon Blanc for John

Warm bread straight from the oven. Who could possibly resist? Not us. There is a watercress pesto, a rich caponata with pine nuts and a divine garlic mayonnaise. This is the hidden first course, as it is just part of your meal. And you can then go and buy the bread in the bakery next door to take home.

We defy you to pass up on the crisp hand cut chips. These are the ones we couldn’t resist

Such a beautifully presented starter plate of the Fairview roast lamb with Jerusalem artichokes

Pretty as a picture, too, was the (Banting) starter portion of a brawnlike tender suckling pig terrine with a sauce grebiche, sliced baby beet and pink onions with some apple squares. Such good intentions....

Then to mains. Tender and delicious herb crusted Boran sirloin with fried marrow, garlic purée, spinach and celeriac for father and daughter. Jordan The Prospector Shiraz was a superb match

Lynne wanted to try the Silver bream, a new fish for her, and it had a good texture - soft and full of flavour, served with a slightly sweet carrot purée and baby roasted carrots. She enjoyed it with the Jordan Barrel Fermented Chenin blanc. The downfall was the chips.

Dessert. So we ordered – allow 20 minutes – with plenty of time, the famous honey and poppy seed soufflés,

served by the pastry chef herself. She breaks the top and pours proper vanilla crème anglaise into each soufflé, which had risen beautifully. They were very sweet, as the insides of the ramekins have to be coated in granulated sugar to get them to rise properly and rise they did. So you do need a rather sweet tooth to enjoy this dessert

And then it is topped with vanilla ice cream...

John, always the chocoholic, had the Valrhona Chocolate marquise with orange jelly and crème fraiche, also topped with vanilla ice cream

And the kitchen came up trumps with a small token to Clare for her birthday. 

Thank you all for another memorable meal. We will be back
The bill for our lunch (with wine by the glass) came to R1460 including 10% tip)

Proteas love the rain

Buying some treats from Louise Starey at the bakery on our way home

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014