This Week's MENU - Taste of Cape Town, Creation celebration, Bouchard Finlayson vertical, Solms Delta, Salted caramel

The end of summer on the beach as gulls tell us the weather is about to change

In this week’s MENU:

 Taste of Cape Town

 Harvest Party at Creation

 Bouchard Finlayson Vertical Tasting

 Authentic experience at Solms Delta

 WTM (World Travel Market) at the CTICC

 Long Weekends

 Salted Caramel

 Learn about wine and cooking

We write about our experiences in MENU, not only to entertain you, but to encourage you to visit the places and events that we do. We know you will enjoy them and we try to make each write up as graphic as we can, so you get a good picture of what is on offer at each place, restaurant, wine farm, festival we visit.

To get the whole story with photographs, please click on “Read on.....” at the end of each paragraph, which will lead you to the related blog, with pictures and more words. At the end of each blog, click on RETURN TO MENU to come back to the blog version of MENU.

Taste of Cape Town     We went on the first evening this year and found it to be a lot more fun than last year, but with less impressive food. And on chatting to some of our hotel, restaurant, wine and cheffie friends, it seems that they want things back the way they were to start with or their presence might be missed next year. We can’t put our finger on what made it so much fun, perhaps seeing so many friends in the wine and food world as well as people attending whom we knew, but it was fun.

We ate and really enjoyed food from two venues, the rest was OK but not terribly exciting to us. It seems that the top restaurants won’t come and do this as a purely PR exercise –would they need to? They don’t make money, but we think they are missing out on introducing new people to their excellent food. Read on…

Harvest Party at Creation     An invitation we were delighted to accept, this turned into a rockingly good evening with DJ Tess playing all the numbers that get you up dancing, lots of food, excellent wine and fun. But there was also a purpose to the evening and for every bottle of wine the guests ordered, 30% was being donated to the local primary school for very necessary supplies, improvements and upliftment. And a lot of wine was drunk. They introduced their new Special Reserve Merlot and it is one to rush off and buy. Intensely fruity but very elegant and layered, this classic merlot shows no green stalkiness and is beautifully made. Yes, we bought some and yes, we stayed in the valley. Read on…

Bouchard Finlayson Vertical Tasting in Town     We were invited to taste some of these great Hemel and Aarde wines at Hildebrand in the Waterfront this week. We do go there a lot but don’t always have time to visit all the wine farms we like and respect. This is one of them and if you find yourselves in the area, do go and do a tasting of these wines. You will find a warm welcome and some superb Chardonnays, Pinot Noirs and elegant red blends, as well as their Blanc de Mer white blend of Riesling, Viognier and Chenin Blanc Read on…

Authentic experience, great food and passionate people at Solms Delta     As Klink judges we are always looking at what else wine farms do to attract customers. Solms Delta in Franschhoek has so much to offer it rather puts the rest to shame. This week we were invited to experience the whole gamut of things on offer and we had a very good day, despite power cuts and rain. John does take his tour customers there for the cultural experiences and wine. Yesterday we discovered how good the restaurant is and the people we met, who so love what they do. We had a wine tasting with the assistant winemaker, Joan Heatlie, a walk through the Dik Delta fynbos food garden with gardener Johan O’Rayn, lunch in Fyndraai restaurant cooked by chef Shaun Schoeman and visit to The Music van de Caab museum with Wanna Malgas. You too can enjoy similar experiences when you visit. Read on…

WTM (World Travel Market) at the CTICC     We managed a brief visit to this international and local travel Market at the Conference Centre on our way back from Franschhoek and have managed to sort out a few interesting things with Turkish Airlines and The Turkish Tourism board as well as making new contacts and networks in the travel trade. It is a vast and very mixed show, with a huge array of travel opportunities, large, down to very small indeed. It is more for the trade than the public however.

Long Weekends     There will be lots of things happening this coming weekend – we will be at the Pinotage & Biltong festival at L’Avenir and hope to see some of you there. We have also been invited to a couple of very exciting places which you will read about next week – dinner on The Queen Mary while she is in port and a night at Bartholomeus Klip. The following long weekend brings the Cheese Festival, the last Market at Groote Post and many more events – check out our What’s On list if you are looking for something to excite you.

Salted Caramel     We have been enjoying chocolate and caramel tarts and desserts so much recently Lynne though you needed this recipe so you can make your own. It is delicious on ice cream, puddings or on a pastry base, then covered with a good dark chocolate ganache. You can also pour it on shortbread to make a millionaires version, topped with the chocolate.

330g white sugar (1½ cups) - 125ml water - 50g butter, cubed – 250 ml cream (1 cup) - 1 tsp vanilla extract – 1 tsp flaked sea salt

Have the butter and the cream to hand. Put the sugar and the water In a heavy bottomed pan and heat until the sugar caramelises. Keep an eye on it as you don’t want the sugar to burn. When it has reached a lovely amber caramel colour, remove from the heat and quickly but carefully add the butter and cream, stirring well. It will be very hot. Add the vanilla extract and then add some of the salt. Taste when cooler and add more till it is to your liking.

You can pour this into a jar and keep in the fridge in a sealed container, just warm to pour. You can add more cream or milk if it is a little thick. You could pour this into a prepared pie crust, or individual ones and then top with a good chocolate ganache made with 150g chopped dark chocolate and 125 ml cream. Heat the cream to scalding but do not boil. Pour over the chocolate pieces and whip together till you have a good thick ganache. Use immediately and enjoy.

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

The Hurst Campus, an accredited school for people who want to become professional chefs, has a variety of courses. See the details here

In addition to his Sense of Taste Culinary Arts School, Chef Peter Ayub runs a four module course for keen home cooks at his Maitland complex. Details here

Nadège Lepoittevin-Dasse has French cooking classes in Noordhoek 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

Nicolette van Niekerk runs baking courses at La Petite Patisserie in Montague Gardens

George Jardine will be running a series of winter cooking courses and other activities at Jordan. Details here

16th April 2015

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.

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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.

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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.

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Cultural, botanical and culinary heritage with wine at Solms Delta

As Klink judges, we are always looking at what else wine farms do to attract customers. Solms Delta in Franschhoek has so much to offer that it rather puts the rest to shame. This week, we were invited to experience the whole gamut of things on offer and we had a very good day, despite power cuts and rain. John does take his tour customers there for the cultural experiences. Yesterday we discovered how good the restaurant is and the people we met, who so love what they do. We had a wine tasting with the assistant winemaker, Joan Heatlie, a walk through the Dik Delta fynbos food garden with gardener Johan O’Rayn, lunch in Fyndraai restaurant cooked by chef Shaun Schoeman and visit to The Musiek van de Caab museum with Wanna Malgas. You, too can enjoy similar experiences when you visit

The wines we tasted. We really like the new label designs of the wines

Lynne on the verandah with assistant winemaker Joan Heatlie

She started with the Vastrap Chenin Blanc. It’s a classic Cape chenin with a kick of elegance from 3% Semillon they added this year

Next we tasted the 2014 Rosé called Lekkerwyn. Made as a classic Rhône rose from 93% Grenache noir and 7% Cinsaut, drinking it reminds one of being in southern France. Crisp and elegant, easy drinking with long fresh and invigorating flavours of strawberry

We went on to taste The 2013 Langarm Shiraz, full of cherries, spice and leather and then the 2011 Hiervandaan Rhône blend of Shiraz, Grenache, Carignan, Viognier and Mourvèdre with sweet and sour plums. It’s a food wine. Then the Africana, their top shiraz, made from desiccated grapes with a full-on mouth of licorice and black cherries, spice and fruit. It has minerality, soft chalky tannins and lots of elegance. The 2011 Gemoedsrus is their version of port, made from Shiraz fortified with grappa. Full of spice, chocolate and sweet berry fruits, it is not too sweet with only 68 gm/l of sugar

The Gemoedsrus is dedicated to the late musician Alex van Heerden (1974-2009) who started the annual Oesfees concerts

The inside of the tasting room has a glass floor suspended over the very old foundations of the building that stood here before

Wines for tasting and purchase

Gardener and fynbos expert Johan O’Rayn taught us so much about what is edible in our local floral kingdom

He showed us around the garden and we tasted many different things. This protea has edible berries in season

Drying calabash gourds

An indigenous fig tree, full of figs waiting to ripen

Edible heart shaped berries that taste like raisins

And another which has four parts

Maketaan wild watermelons. These grow wild in the fields countrywide. They have no flavour, but can be turned into a watermelon konfyt (confit) which is pieces of crisp and syrupy watermelon flesh, flavoured with ginger and sometimes cinnamon and eaten with cheese

This was a giant

Its tiny yellow flowers

Spekboom (translation bacon bush! No, not a ham bush) These grow all over South Africa, even in very dry areas, are eaten by elephants and other animals. They are one of the best absorbers of carbon emissions in the world. They are full of vitamin C and taste sharply sour, so are good with rich meats. We had them with lunch and they were delicious

Our indigenous wild “rosemary”, although it is not related, also known as kapokbossie or snow bush as, after flowering, the seeds float off like snow. It is used in medicines and food

The flowers

The num num ‘plum’ ripens to dark red and can be eaten. It is a variety of wild jasmine

Many local pelargoniums can be eaten or used as a medicinal herb. The leaves of many varieties have different flavours such as mint, chocolate, lemon, etc.

Another edible leaf

Buchu can be used as a herb or in tea

A Kei Apple. It resembles a small apricot and is rather good to eat, quite meaty and juicy. The tall thorny bush can be used to keep cattle and people out of your property

The manure of the native Nguni cattle on the property is used to fertilise the garden

He’s a formidable bull (on the right)

Wonderful horns

The Fyndraai restaurant

We met the chef, Shaun Schoeman, but not for the first time. He was previously at Aubergine under Chef Harald Bresselschmidt

The mission statement in the menu

Good herb rolls

Starters

Lynne had the ox tongue. It was perfect. So many people serve tongue as thin slices. This is how it should be served, in tender 1 cm thick slices. The sharp vinaigrette and spekboom were the perfect foil for the rich tongue, and the rich jus was also excellent. We each drank a glass of the wine recommended on the menu. Lynne made her Amalie (a blend of Grenache blanc, Chenin, Roussanne, Viognier) last for both courses. It’s a wine we like and buy and sold very well in our shop. It has caramel, toast and salt on the nose, sweet golden plums on the silky palate and is fresh with good acidity

John had the smoked ostrich carpaccio with a num num sauce and fynbos greens. Lovely tender, gently smoked ostrich. And the sauces were sweet plum and green herb. The leafy herb on top was hard to eat; it’s a bit like cotton wool in texture

Main course menu

Lynne ordered the wild herb crusted kingklip, the line fish of the day. She had originally ordered the snoek parcels but the waiter then came to warn her that the snoek came with its bones in the parcel. It is a notoriously bony fish and after two serious fish bone incidents, Lynne is very cautious about bones in fish and was very grateful for the information and the offer to change her order. Kingklip is a firm fish with large flakes, rather like cod and takes flavour well. The tomato bredie was a good foil and the creamy leeks and the crayfish vinaigrette were an excellent addition to the dish. The crisp deep fried onion slices were something new, we had never seen this done before and they were terrific. The onion had carmelised but was crispy crunchy.

Johns main was the braised (bontebok) venison, still pink inside but a little chewy. The potato rösti soaked up all the juices and the butternut purée was rather sweet. He also loved the onion slices

The Dessert menu. How, we thought, could we possibly order dessert but, because the main courses were not gargantuan, we did

Lynne chose the warm banana malva pudding, topped with a chocolate ganache and accompanied by a rich vanilla ice cream. It was like a combination of carrot cake, malva pudding and the best banana bread topped with chocolate. John was very envious

In an adventurous mood, he ordered the Rooibos cheesecake. Very wobbly and full of rooibos flavour, no chance of Lynne stealing any of that, she abhors rooibos. It was accompanied by an interesting citrus sorbet to cut the richness. Both dishes came with a wild berry coulis

Sadly, we could not have coffee as, during dessert, Solms Delta was a victim of ‘Load shedding’ and they couldn't use the espresso machine. We didn’t mind at all

At the end of the menu, they have this interesting glossary of terms to explain items on the menu. It so helps if you don’t understand something in a dish

Then it was time to meet Wanna Malgas and restaurant manager Ronel van Rooyen. Wanna took us to see the Music Museum

A small house on the estate

The sign explains it all

The exhibits are interactive and very interesting. Sadly, because of the power cut, Wanna could not use any of their recordings and had to explain a lot to us. She does it very well

She demonstrated all these replica instruments and it was a lot of fun. John, who used to play the trumpet, amazed her at his skill on the kelp horn, actually getting a semblance of a tune out of it.

She demonstrated the bull roarer which she says is useful when chasing away bees on the estate, it certainly sounds like a swarm in anger

These are Olieblik guitars, made out of old oil tins by Wanna and her helpers

She demonstrated how she plays them

She has been on the farm for 22 years and is quite a personality and is full of valuable information

We then made a quick trip to see the archaeological museum. Solms Delta is on the site of an ancient prehistoric settlement and they have collected many historic artefacts from the site. The black tiles commemorate slaves who were buried on the farm

The next room has a video screen which shows films of people involved with the farm's history

A Danish/German couple visiting from Germany, enjoying the Solms Delta experience

Koloni is a blend of Muscat de Frontignan and Muscat d’Alexandrie. Rose petals and honey on the nose, it has a residual sugar 16 g and a wonderful sugar and acid balance, rather like a good Rhine wine. It has spent 18 months on the lees. It is currently on special at R35 a bottle and we bought a case to take home. It will be superb with dessert, cheese and spicy food

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus

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