Open tasting of the range of Cabo Esperança Wines

La Vie en Rose with Kyle

Kyle Martin has long been a business friend. He used to sell us wine when we had the shop and has remained a personal friend ever since. Recently, he started up his own wine business, Cabo Esperança Wines representing, initially, four good wine producers: Blackwater Wines, Keermont, Oak Valley and Vondeling. His inaugural trade tasting was held at La Vie Café Bar, on the beachfront at Rocklands, on Monday evening and we tasted some really special and two very unusual wines

La Vie put up a good selection of sushi made by their sushi chef as well as some other canapés

Francois Haasbroek talks about his BlackWater wines. He is also consulting at some other wine producers, including Bloemendal in Durbanville

Some interested tasters of his wines. We loved his very different wine made from Bourboulenc grapes, the first to be made in South Africa from this ancient varietal

We met Alex Starey, winemaker at Keermont, Stellenbosch for the first time and tasted the Keermont wines. They are on the same road as De Trafford, to whom they supply grapes, and there is a huge similarity in the intense flavours of these wines; the terroir also shows .  Previously, they exported all their wines, so it is good to see these now available for the local market. Several people were interested in putting them on their lists

Straight from their holiday in Swellendam and then the Elim Festival are Louise and Mark Herd of Sunset Beach Wine & Deli, seen here with Christopher Rawbone-Viljoen of Oak Valley

observed by James Pietersen

Sue Proudfoot of Wine Concepts talks to Jane Eedes on the Vondeling table, while winemaker Matthew Copeland chats to other members of the trade. They had their Methode Ancestral for tasting and it was very popular

Francois Haasbroek with Rian du Plessis of Pick n Pay, Waterfront

A merry band of wine people: Jane Eedes, Kyle Martin, Matthew Coleman and Lynne at the Vondeling table

The Cabo Esperança wine list

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Text and Photographs © John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

The Elim Wine & Food Celebration

Early on Saturday morning, we picked up our friends and, trusting our GPS, headed off to the wilds near the southern tip of Africa, Cape Agulhas. We have learned, lately, not to trust the GPS implicitly, as this was another occasion when it got its directions horribly wrong and took us on a detour on very bumpy dirt roads. But, when we reached Black Oystercatcher Winery in Elim, we knew that the 3½ hour trip had been worth it. It was a real old fashioned country wine and food festival with the lovely wines of the area and masses of food stalls, music and other entertainment. Given the distance, we were amazed how many people from Cape Town had been attracted to the fiesta.

Winemakers, brand and sales managers representing the farms at the festival welcomed us

The grapes from Cederberg’s multi award winning wine brand, Ghost Corner, all come from the Elim area. Here are Pieter du Toit and Janine Steyn serving us a selection. The Semillon and the Sauvignon Blanc are very much to our taste, crisp, lean and elegant and full of the flavour of this rocky southernmost terroir in Africa.

We really like the Lomond wines, which we tasted. They have two very good blends, Lomond SSV (Sauvignon, Semillon with a dash of Viognier) and their crisp elegant Snowbush Sauvignon Semillon blend. They have three different Sauvignon Blancs, all delicious, all different. And there are lovely spicy Syrahs. They treated everyone to good smoked salmon and cream cheese crackers

Kobus Gerber pouring a taste for Lynne

Caroline Poulter van Schalkwyk who worked for Strandveld Vineyards for several years was the polished MC for the day . She is now with Steenberg as their Marketing Manager

Caroline with her husband Anthony, who is Marketing Manager at Ken Forrester Wines

Are they twins? We don’t know, but they look like it. The Giant Periwinkle wines are made at Zoetendal by Pierre and Allan Rabie

The Berrio being poured

David Trafford’s farm at Malgas produces the Sijnn wines. They are wines of huge quality and flavour. Sales & Marketing Manager Christine Andrews talks to a fan

Everyone tasting wine and food under one of the large marquees

Simon Harrison of @wine pours his shiraz

Jean Pierre Daneel with his mum Renée on the Jean Daneel stand. They are known for superb Chenin Blancs as well as a great wine, Signature Red, made from Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz. We bought one of our lunch dishes here, a superb jambon persille. We also had very good crisp calamari and chips

Jean Daneel wines chilling in the warm weather

The huge marquee had plenty of occupants

but we found a table for some lunch

Wine cocktails at the Black Oystercatcher bar

Girls always enjoy a chat

Pieter Arno du Toit of Cederberg wines with Elmine Nel of Babylonstoren

A line up of farm tractors to admire

The crowded car park

Sunset at de Kelders at the end of a lovely day

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Text and Photographs © John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

Dinner at The White Room at Dear Me

On Friday night, we visited The White Room at Dear Me, having been invited to taste the Five Course food and wine pairing menu at this Cape Town restaurant, which has just been placed in the Eat Out top 20 list of best restaurants in South Africa, and is nominated for a place in the top 10. The timing couldn't have been better

Chef Vanessa Marx is over the moon with joy at her nomination and, having tasted the food, we think she deserves it. Two of her dishes really intrigued, amazed and delighted us.

The two tasting menus. We decided to share the menu and, where there were two alternative dishes, we had one of each and swapped plates and glasses during the meal. This is not ideal, as the tasting portions of wine come early on and your partner watches as you demolish your share before the food arrives!

It is a very white room, peaceful and serene

First, a bread board with parsley pesto, sundried tomato pesto, butter and pink salt with good bread. We also received an amuse of tiny deep fried rice balls (Suppli) with mayonnaise, but we ate them before we remembered we needed a picture. It happens

Starter No.1:  a fresh ceviche of kabeljou, dressed with lime, chilli and sesame seeds, sprouts and a dash or two of lime mayonnaise. It was the perfect match for the Colmant Brut Reserve NV MCC, highlighting all its wonderful flavours

Starter No.2: A very thin slice of pork terrine ‘mosaic’. It was delicious, but we could have demolished half an inch in depth!  The orange segments and the crispy pieces of pork were great accompaniments, but we don’t like vanilla with meat; we find it very cloying. It is easy to avoid on the plate. The matching wine, Thorne and Daughters Rocking Horse Cape White 2013 was a new wine for us. It’s a blend of Roussanne, Chardonnay, Semillon and Chenin blanc from different vineyards in the Western Cape and is in the oxidised style which we think works with food, but not without. They are negociants

This was the dish of the day, week and month for Lynne. It took a while to get one’s head around the combinations, but when you did, the penny dropped and all the band started to play. It was like being Peter Rabbit in Mr McGregor’s vegetable garden, demolishing all his baby vegetables. You start with tiny spring vegetables, perfectly cooked, so they are still sweet. Then you encounter the cocoa and truffle crunchy ‘soil’, initially sweet and chocolatey until the earthy truffle kicks in. And then there is the pond of fresh courgette, pea and mint veloute. Different textures, different tastes all came together perfectly. The CWG Cederberg Semillon 2010 could not have been a better match; full, elegant and crisply lime, it highlighted the dish.

Yes, we did eat the next course and enjoyed the pea and herb risotto very much, especially with the earthy Crystallum Pinot noir 2009. We cannot always “Bant” at good restaurants

Main Course No.1: S’Kaap tjoppie (Cape lamb chop) with a rich jus and some interesting vegetable chips, mushrooms and cream sauce. The Thelema The Mint Cabernet Sauvignon 2011 was as smooth as silk and the intense fruit really brought out the best in the meat and added some mint!

Main Course No.2: Poached trout in a weak broth with seaweed and shiitake mushrooms. This was served with a rather sweet draught Hakutsuru Sake

Vanessa visits each table with the dessert. We had a long chat with her about her food and the awards. She has had this special light box made to shine through the whole honeycomb which is then melted and poured warm over the dessert.

A very innovative way to present pure honey

That dessert! So special, so unexpected and so delicious. Caciotta cheese panna cotta with no sugar added was more of a nearly set puddle of light cheese cream on the plate. It is sprinkled with roasted sunflower seeds; freeze dried raspberries which add piquancy and perfume; and crushed ‘honeycomb’. The warm honey from the comb is then poured over it. It gives you a mouthful of so many different textures and flavours and temperatures and is wonderful. Picture before the honey is added

After the honey. It was served with the D’Aria Lullaby 2013, a NLH made from Semillon with an RS of 145 gm/l. Its honeyed flavours well matched the dessert. We do need to compliment the Sommelier Joseph Dafana, who put these matches together with the food. He will be a huge loss to the White room as he is joining the new La Colombe. Someone whose career we will watch with interest

The White Room and Dear Me will be found at 165 Longmarket St, Cape Town
Phone:  021 422 4920

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Text and Photographs © John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014

Lunch at Mariana's, Stanford

After our visit to the Elim Festival, we spent the night at a friend’s daughter’s holiday house in De Kelders, where we had a lovely relaxing evening and morning, reading papers and our books, cooking huge prawns for supper, watching whales and poachers, getting some sun while doing the crossword and then it was time to head over to Stanford, where we had managed to get a reservation for lunch. We have not been for several years, as this small restaurant is amazingly popular (deservedly so) and bookings are hard to get. We were warmly welcomed by Peter Esterhuizen and given a lovely table outside on the vine-covered terrace, facing Mariana’s legendary vegetable garden. Then came the wonderful food.

A whale in the bay with its calf

Chilling with the Sunday Times crossword

The entrance on Du Toit Street, Stanford
The impressive vegetable garden, flanked by mulberry trees laden with fruit and birds

The stoep

Overflow seating in the garden

Our table for (most of) lunch

Chef Mariana bringing fresh herbs to her kitchen

The lunch menu. It is fresh, real food and there is something for everyone. We loved the literal - Peter had not noticed that he had written Waterblop soup instead of waterblom.

Peter explains the food

and takes our orders

We took wine from our cellars. The first bottle was an excellent Oak Valley 2011 Sauvignon blanc, which was followed by one of Lourens van der Westhuisen’s magnificent 2011 Barrel-fermented Chardonnays

Then, from our cellar, a magnificent 2001 Malbec from Fairview. A bit of sediment, but glorious fruit

The cork broke on removal so it had to be strained and presented in a jug. Lovely aromas, no faults and its flavour lasted in the jug

The very beautiful broad bean quiche

We shared two starters. The first was the Stanford starter: Dolmades, good salami, olives and fresh-from-the-garden broad bean humus

The second was the savoury and rich Springbok Rillette served with seed bread and cucumber pickle

The Waterblom soup with a breadstick

Rows of broad beans and beans in the garden with the mountains in the distance

Tempting broad beans

And lovely lettuces interplanted with what looks like tarragon and a rouge arum

Their house is the other side of the garden

Umbrellas up under the pergola as rain was expected

A wheelbarrow planting

Lynne having a laugh at the weather. What was supposed to be a forecasted minute of rain turned into rather a long and heavy thunderstorm. We didn’t mind at all

Main courses arriving. Confit duck for John on a bed of carrots and grains, a broad bean salad and some preserved kumquats

Perfectly cooked trout with waterblom, braised leeks and new potatoes

The cheese roulade stuffed with spinach with oven baked tomatoes

Lynne had the simmered lamb shoulder with a great green pesto, fresh beetroot, white butter beans and roasted tomatoes

The rain made it impossible to stay outside, so we moved, with nearly everyone else, inside

The chef, Mariana Esterhuizen, who is the heart of the establishment, came to see if we were enjoying ourselves. We were

There was one table who braved the elements on the stoep. It was cosy inside, but all were having a good time

Rabbit décor

The garden in the rain

An important notice at the front door

Um, I thought that said "no dogs"? A cute Boston terrier puppy, carried in a bag by a young customer. Maybe she was too small to count

Dessert choices

Mulberry season in the garden

enjoyed by an olive thrush

“We really don’t mind the rain”
Welcome shelter from an early summer storm

Of course, John had the chocolate "Chocup"! Rich, warm and gooey, served with marmalade and almond Langue de chat biscuits

Ronnie could not resist the Doodskoot (lit. translation Dead shot) Double Espresso, served with a shot of local grappa and some homemade vanilla ice cream with almond cantuccini biscuits

It’s so rare to see Mulberries on the menu, so Lynne and Loraine had to have the Mulberry Trio. Dark and intense mulberry sorbet, a mulberry marshmallow and a tiny mulberry tart with superbly crisp pastry. A superb lunch

The sun came out and all was fresh and new

We will definitely be back. This is the food that all the top chefs are trying to achieve

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Text and Photographs © John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014