Friday, September 05, 2025

Birthday lunch at HIRO Izakaya, Constantia Uitsig

Getting older is not something one feels like celebrating over a certain age,
so this year Lynne's birthday was a quiet celebration 'à deux' over lunch at a new venue for us,
Hiro Izakaya at Constantia Uitsig. It is chef Cheyne Morrisby's new venture

Small cottages in the grounds of Constantia Uitsig now house several different restaurants
and we were happy to sit on the terrace, as it was a good sunny day for a change

Waiting for our table while the photographer takes his time

We decided not to sit inside, but it is nicely decorated

and quite spacious

Studying the menu to see how things work

The menu explains it all

Drinks. We decided to drink beer; it does go well with Asian food
The only wines are from Constantia Uitsig's "lower-priced" range

Lovely views of the Constantia mountains and vineyards

You can walk in the Uitsig Heritage gardens

We must say that the taste of the food overall was excellent, but the portions are very small; often just one bite
Why is it when you share plates between two that you get three portions? Too small to cut in two, so who gets more?

This is Tuna Tataki. Tacos with lime avocado aioli, one bite. R170
And some dishes have hefty surcharges, so we avoided those as we wanted to stick to the R700 menu
We drank Devil's Peak King's Peak Pale ale which came in the smallest bottles we have ever seen. R52
Served in very ordinary 250ml size tumblers

The portions are very small. Thin strips of crisp Mumbai Chilli Beef in a Teriyaki cardamom glaze at R148

River prawn tempura, tamarind unagi, garlic truffle emulsion
Really delicious and crisp with great sauces, but about two prawns cut up into six bite-sized pieces
The waiter dropped one of the pieces and the manager did generously bring us another plate
But is this good value at R140?  We see huge profit margins. Price over substance

Duck, Lime leaf & miso croquettes. Duck Duck sauce, Holy leaf salad
Um, that's mint on top, not basil or salad. Again three portions to share and they were tiny, one mouthful each
Wonderful flavours. R145

Some excitement, Baboons appeared; it is, apparently, a daily occurrence and the waiters were off to chase them away
It took a while 

Metal sculptures on the roof to deter them

Don't seem to work; they are probably seen as lazy members of the troop

Oven roasted Aubergine Dengkaro, Miso, Mirin, Sake R100
We love aubergine, especially cooked Asian style but this, sadly, was only half cooked and chewy
Good flavours

Lynne was really surprised and touched when the staff came and sang Happy Birthday to her!
The service was excellent

The underwhelming Ding Dong Sundae. One scoop of Vanilla ice cream in a tumbler does not a Sundae make
The same tumbler as the beer. Not much chocolate sauce, some raspberry gel and some bashed shortbread crumbs. R125

The meal cost R941 including three beers and 10% tip

Views of the back of Table Mountain in the far distance

Aggressive pose of metal mesh baboon

We took a peak at the Tas(t)ing room... but it seems you now taste the wine in the Wine Sales shop across the way. Confusing

All the stories we have produced since 2012 can be opened from the archive list near the top of the column on the right of this page

Posted by MENU at 11:51 am 0 comments

Thursday, September 04, 2025

Lamb shanks and guitars at the Swartberg Hotel, Prince Albert

Our second concert was to be at the famous Swartberg Hotel and included a three course dinner
before the concert to be held at 8 to 9 pm

At 6 pm we arrived for dinner

Recommendations for diners not attending the concert

Very warm and well lit dining room

This young lady was very helpful all evening showing Lynne to our table
We did move, as the table we'd been allocated had the chair back facing the very cold window
but that was not a problem for them 


The menu for that evening's music ticket holders. We ordered a small carafe of white wine and one of red from the menu

They were both from Fairview's very reasonably priced La Capra range, priced at R75 each

Very thin slices of delicious smoked ostrich carpaccio topped with Parmesan cheese shavings,
micro greens and some very thinly sliced preserved figs. No sign of the truffle oil
Served with bread rolls. Could have been a tad more generous?

John opted for the thick Biltong soup and said it was enjoyable, if a bit salty, but that is the nature of Biltong

We both opted for the lamb shank but misread the menu and expected mash and peas
but were served mashed semi food processor chopped fresh peas which were not good. It needed potatoes
The balsamic beetroot was fine, but an odd vegetable with lamb
The lamb shank was huge but dry and they had forgotten to put on the "Full bodied red wine sauce advertised
We asked and a small jug was brought which did add flavour to a very strange dish


The desert of Poached pears with
maple flavoured cream  was underwhelming
No sign of maple flavours in either the light cream from a canister or the one pear's juice
Some of the serving staff have a lot of attitude and were unhelpful

The concert was held in a venue room next to the restaurant

Titled  "Breakfast in Cape Town, Lunch in New York, Dinner in Prince Albert
with Nick Turner on acoustic guitar and Schalk Joubert on electric guitar

Nick and Schalk share a deep musical history, from Sons of Trout and Mikanic to countless award-winning productions
In 2004 Nick moved to New York City with his band Mikanic
During his stay in the Big Apple he collaborated with a some of the best in the business,
most notably Bakhiti Kumalo and Tony Cedras (of Paul Simon fame), Zolani Mahola (Freshly Ground)
and Nathi Gcabashe (Hugh Masekela Band)
The band played and sold out many of New York City’s legendary venues
including Lincoln Centre, CBGB’s, Joe’s Pub, The Knitting Factory and Symphony Space

Vocals by Nick Turner and very good guitar playing from both

Schalk Joubert playing the electric guitar. We did not recognise many of the songs they sang and played
most written by Nick Turner who was once part of Mike and the Mechanics in the USA
Some jazz and ranging from rock, reggae, and afro-pop to ghoema, hip-hop, and jazz




All the stories we have produced since 2012 can be opened from the archive list near the top of the column on the right of this page

Posted by MENU at 3:21 pm 0 comments

Gay's Guernsey Dairy, Prince Albert and the first Kaleidoscope concert we attended

Our first Kaleidoscope Chamber Music concert in Prince Albert was held at 5 pm - “The African String Quartet”
with the Cape Philharmonic Youth Orchestra String Quartet
The venue was Gay's Guernsey Dairy, where outstanding cheese is made from their herd of Guernsey cows
You could opt for a cheese platter with wine before the concert, but we had booked for the second concert that evening
which included a full meal at the Swartberg Hotel before that concert

Aren't they pretty?

Plenty of parking until Lynne realised that John had to drive back to our accommodation,
where she had left the tickets! Oops. It was a long busy week....

The farm shop entrance

The musicians setting up before the concert

We went to buy some of the famous cheese. Sadly, the very strong cheddar was completely sold out,
so we bought Emmenthal and Gouda. You can taste before you buy
Lynne also bought a jar of what looked like superb organic honey but, sadly, it turned out to be rather syrupy

Chatting to the man who organises, manages logistics for the Cape Philharmonic orchestra,
sets up for the players and then packs up afterwards

Time to take our seats. Held in their small barn, it was a concert bursting at the seams with an enthusiastic audience

Tony Alcock (double bass)

Cape Philharmonic Youth Orchestra String Quartet
Corban Beukes (violin), Loren Ehlers (violin and accordion), Jason Oppelt (viola), John Minnaar (cello), Tony Alcock (double bass)

Programme
🇿🇦 Karla van Niekerk (1999*)

String Quintet in F major
🇳🇬 Godwin Sadoh (1965*)

Ise Oluwa
🇿🇦 Mokale Koapeng (1963*)
Komeng

🇳🇬 Godwin Sadoh (1965*)
Egba Musical Totem

🇿🇦 Traditional South African Hymn Thula Thula
(arr. for string quartet by Samson Diamond)

🇿🇦 Soweto String Quartet
“Zebra Crossing”

🇿🇦 Traditional South African Hymn iBuyile iAfrika
(arr. for string quartet by Samson Diamond)

🇿🇦 Loren Ehlers (2003*)
Self Portrait

It was a very professional and enjoyable concert

We bought some eggs laid by the free range chickens, so fresh, so different from supermarket eggs, which are never fresh



Real free range eggs. The chickens live in the fields and the henhouse is moved when necessary

Another place to lay eggs?

All the stories we have produced since 2012 can be opened from the archive list near the top of the column on the right of this page


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