Wednesday, November 30, 2022

A Southern Cape weekend

A weekend in the Country. We made an escape down to the Cape Agulhas area for a wine festival and to enjoy the weekend away from home. We took our visiting friends from Holland, who have not been able to come here for four years because of Covid. We booked accommodation near Pearly Beach and wanted to show them this lovely area, which is about 2½ hours' drive out of Cape Town. Well, not if you leave the city on Friday afternoon, when everyone else is also leaving, but we were not in any rush and stopped along the way to get pies for lunch at Houw Hoek, which seems now to have the best in the Elgin valley, and to pick up provisions at Gansbaai Spar. Our friends had never been to the very southernmost tip of Africa, so that was on the agenda. The weather was perfect all weekend, even though these clouds did seem a little unsettling

Our small but perfectly formed cottage at Klein Paradijs Country Retreat
They are on Booking.com and have several different standards of accommodation
We chose the budget variety and were very impressed with the humble cottage
which proved to be much comfier than the pictures had implied
Two bedrooms, a bathroom, a lounge, kitchen, binne and buite braais and, most important in summer,
a stoep where we could enjoy the evening and morning meals

The lounge area at one end

Kitchen and binnebraai at the other

A comfortable bed

A glass of Silverthorn River Dragon to get the weekend started

and, at 7, we drove off over the hills to Baardskeerdersbos for a fish and chip supper at Marietjie’s Pub
where we have eaten before and wanted to come back for the good food
You can drive the 31.5 Km conventional, long, route, but there is a much quicker way from Klein Paradijs, over a low hill, 
down a dirt road and only about 8 minutes away

You can eat on the terrace

but it books up quickly

so we chose inside




Indoor gardening?

Oh, so fresh, hake in batter, with good chips, a small salad, lemon and a tartare sauce, all for R80

and, as we finished dinner, a little after 8, another power cut, and so a romantic candlelit end to the day

They stop serving food at 8, so there were not many people left in the pub

Our bill. We drank a bottle of Kranskop Chenin blanc with the meal and were not charged corkage

A nightcap by torchlight

We took our friends to see Pearly Beach the next morning, a very pretty small seaside village with a lovely sandy beach

Lynne loves to beachcomb

Yvonne enjoying the sea air

Come and join us lads? But they don't enjoy walking on beach sand. Firm friends for 70 years

Gulls catching the updraughts

Everything was a beautiful blue

A tiny daisy surviving on the boardwalk

A European barn swallow (Hirundo rustica)

Thanks for correction by reader Peter who says it is a Greater Striped swallow (Cecropis cucullata)

We went to the Agulhas Triangle wine festival that afternoon (see separate story)
and then went back to the cottage to relax and enjoy a braai supper
John photographed this Jackal Buzzard (Buteo rufofuscus) in flight

We had brought a rather special bottle of wine to enjoy with dinner, 2009 Ad Honorem Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz blend,
made by Erika Obermeyer with Pieter Ferreira, cellarmaster at Graham Beck wines,
to honour the legacy of the late Graham Beck (1929-2010) and chosen after his death from a special barrel selection
It really is a very special wine, a classic red blend,
with all the fruit, gravitas, weight, minerality and layered flavours you would expect and we so enjoyed drinking it
If you have some, it could go another 10 years and still be superb
Graham Beck is now a specialist Cap Classique producer, so they will not produce more still wines

The back label

The meat on the buite (outside) braai

We enjoyed some good well-aged steaks, Boerewors and lamb chops...

... with a French salad, coleslaw and baked potatoes. A lovely summer's evening in the country

Sunset turning the clouds pink
It did rain heavily in the night, but all the clouds had disappeared by the morning

"Time for bed", said Zebedee...

and a clear sky, pink dawn with a new moon the next morning

We set off to see Cape Agulhas, the southern tip of Africa

Passing large farms with sheep, cattle, wheat and grapes

A pair of blue cranes (Anthropoides paradiseus) by a waterhole. The blue crane is South Africa's national bird

A useful Information board at the Cape

A Bloukop Koggelmander/Southern rock agama/Blue-headed Agama Lizard (Agama atra)

So tame, he posed for John

The Cape of Gulls, the most southerly point on the African continent,
the place where the Atlantic and the Indian Oceans meet. Next stop Antarctica

Yvonne and Peter had to have the obligatory photograph taken to prove they had been there

We had taken a picnic for lunch and had it near this wreck on the coast just a couple of kilometres after the point
The wreck of Meisho Maru No.38, a Japanese fishing vessel
which ran aground in a storm off Cape Agulhas on 16th November 1982
The crew of 17 all managed to swim to safety

and what else would we enjoy with lunch, but one of our favourite wines, SeaSalter Sauvignon blanc from Groote Post

A toast to travel and widening horizons

The impressive Cape Agulhas Lighthouse
It was the third lighthouse to be built in South Africa, in 1849, and is the second-oldest still operating, after Green Point
Lynne thinks it looks slightly Egyptian
and wondered whether the architect was echoing the ancient Lighthouse of Alexandria at the other end of Africa?

Then we drove to Struisbaai to watch the fishing boats coming in and sit a while on the docks. It was a dazzling blue day

Kids having fun jumping off the end of the dock

Lynne and Yvonne were lucky enough to see the local treasures, the large black stingrays that live around the dock

Then, as the afternoon progressed, the fishing boats started coming in

A man in a special fishing canoe, well-protected from the sun

Some people SUPping and another canoe fisherman

The scientific name of the silver fish is Argyrozona argyrozona, known locally as Silvers, they are Carpenter Sea bream
They must get very bashed and bruised by this treatment

A very pretty fish, which comes from this area. Lynne has eaten them and they can be quite bony

This boat had caught a huge catch of Yellowtail. Again, subjected to lots of rough treatment, throwing them into the boxes
There were commercial and private customers all around

We enjoyed an ice cream and then headed off on the long 4½ hour drive back to Sea Point, feeling very rested and revived
These summer weekends away are a joy

All our stories can be seen in the Blog Archive near the top of the column on the right

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Posted by MENU at 1:44 pm 2 comments

Tuesday, November 29, 2022

Agulhas Triangle wine festival

When we heard, way back in early September, that there was going to be an Agulhas Triangle Wine Festival,
we booked accommodation immediately, as close to the site as we could afford
We love these southernmost Cape wines but it is rather a long way from Cape Town
and making a summer weekend of it in November seemed to be A GOOD THING
It was held at Lomond Wine Farm, which is just south of Gansbaai on the Baardskeerdersbos road

Organised by Andre Morgenthal, perhaps best known for heading the Old Vines project,
we were delighted to hear that it was fully subscribed and so we hope that they will be able to repeat it next year
It was a blast. And we saw several people we know, like Billie Lambrechts, here enjoying a laugh with a friend


Not just wines, but local beers and ciders:
Ice cold cans of Bruce Jack’s Salute to the sun, brewed from sustainable sorghum


and these Fraser’s Folly cans from Black Oystercatcher - and such great wines

We are huge fans of Strandveld wines, they are always in our cellar and what a great chance to taste the new vintages
Elim where they are grown, is one of the coolest wine areas in South Africa, the soils are rocky and full of minerals
so their Sauvignon Blancs are excellent. But then so are their red wines
Conrad Vlok, the winemaker, was awarded the prestigious Winemaker of the Year award that very night
It is so well deserved


Thinus Botha showed us the wines from Ghost Corner, which is owned by Cederberg wines
They really impressed us the most,
the concentration and elegance and crispness of the Sauvignons and Semillons are backed up by their recent awards
Their two Sauvignons Blanc are some of the best we have tasted this year
The Wild Ferment and the Bowline Sauvignon/Semillon blend knocked our socks off, as did the newly released Semillon
Jerome van Rooi, one of their winemakers, was awarded the Young Winemaker of the Year title this year
This is not a farm or area to ignore if you like classic white wines. They also produce formidable Shirazes


What to taste next? So many choices


So, next, to taste the wines of Black Oystercatcher


They have a good range of wines, including a 2017 Cap Classique Brut Rosé, made from Merlot


Zoetendal was a renewed discovery for us and we enjoyed their Sauvignon Blanc
and the Monarch, a Cabernet Shiraz red blend with four other Bordeaux varietals

Enjoying meeting Robert Stelzner of The Giant Periwinkle and tasting The Bard,
an interesting blend of Semillon, Viognier, Nouvelle and as he puts it, a dab of Sauvignon Blanc
Nouvelle, a cross between Cape Riesling (Crouchen blanc) and Ugni Blanc (Trebbiano Toscano)
is not used very much at all in South Africa
The wine is not named for Shakespeare but for Baardskeerdersbos

Live music brightened up the day


Finding a place to sit was not easy, but we did eventually find a comfortable shared table


while people queued for tastings


and some picnicked on the grass


We bought pies for our lunch


Lots of good meat, but also thick pastry


and, visiting Lomond brand ambassador Gianni Lozzi at their stall we found Andre Morgenthal, who organised the Festival


Cheerfully pouring all day


David Trafford and winemaker Charla Bosman on the Sijnn stall
The wines are different, sustainable and push boundaries
And both David’s farms, De Trafford in Stellenbosch and Sijnn garner good awards here and internationally
These Malgas grapes from Southern Rhône and Portuguese varietals are grown in a warm dry climate
and very different soils from David’s other farm, high in the Stellenbosch mountains,
where he produces excellent and complex red wines Both farms produce excellent Chenins


Billie Lambrechts, back for another taste of the Lomond wines

All our stories can be seen in the Blog Archive near the top of the column on the right

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Friday, November 25, 2022

In MENU This Week. Diemersfontein Clockmaker Chenin, Bolzano in the Boland, Platter 2023 reveal

A Jackal Buzzard (Buteo rufofuscus) in flight 

Before we say anything else, we congratulate Conrad Vlok of Strandveld Vineyards and Jerome van Rooi of Cederberg, this year’s Winemaker and Young Winemaker of the Year. We are delighted for both of them. However, we are not saying anything more, except to them in private. We were invited to the black tie awards dinner by the sponsoring bank. We turned it down. We were expected to drive a 210Km round trip at our own expense, then either drive home at midnight after a wine-filled event or pay to stay overnight in the hotel, minimum cost R3450 – to publicise their event. ‘Nuff said!

But here are this week’s stories - of a wonderful weekend event at one of our favourite wine estates and special awards for some of our favourite winemakers. Thank you for reading; enjoy them!

Diemersfontein launches The Clockmaker Old Vine Chenin blanc

We were invited by David and Sue Sonnenberg to the launch of the new Diemersfontein 2021 Old Vine Chenin Blanc called The Clockmaker. The name tells a wonderful story from some of the farm’s history. In 1942, South Africa and Italy were at war. Italy was aligned with Hitler and Nazi Germany. Italians saw action in Albania, Greece and Yugoslavia and in Libya, an Italian colony since 1911, which was where Italian troops encountered the South African forces in the Western Desert. A young Italian man Cesare Zanardi was taken prisoner, brought to South Africa and sent, with 2 other prisoners, to work on Diemersfontein. Read on…

Bolzano in the Boland

An Italian Celebration at Diemersfontein on Saturday 12th November to launch The Clockmaker Old Vine Chenin blanc was open to the public and was very well subscribed. Read on…

Platter 2023 Awards at Jordan Restaurant

The Launch of the 2023 Platter Guide, sponsored by Diners Club, was held at Jordan wine estate on the 17th of November. We were invited to attend the awards presentation and the reveal of the colour of this year’s guide, always a closely guarded secret. The guide will be available in stores from December 10th 2022. The Digital version was released at this launch and is available now on the apps for iOS/Apple and Android, and on the website, www.wineonaplatter.com  Read on…




All our stories can be seen in the Blog Archive near the top of the column on the right

If you do not wish to receive e-mails from us, please email menucape@gmail.com with the word 'UNSUBSCRIBE' in your email

Posted by MENU at 11:01 am  
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