This Week's MENU - Saronsberg vertical, Queen Mary 2, Biltong & Pinotage, Bartolomeus Klip, Pea & ham soup

Bartholomeus Klip has a breeding herd of disease free Cape buffalo

In this week’s MENU:

 Saronsberg go Full Circle

 Dinner on Queen Mary 2

 Pinotage and Biltong Festival at L’Avenir

 Bartholomeus Klip for a quiet overnight stay

 Bartholomeus Klip Pea and Mint Soup

 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.

We are sending you a short (not very) and sweet (very) MENU this week as we know lots of you will be away for the long weekend. And we are really busy right up until Friday and won’t have time to do this any other day than today, Tuesday. It has been an exciting and rather luxurious week for us, full of contrasts and a lot of fun

Saronsberg go Full Circle     Once a year, Saronsberg raid their vinoteque and produce a vertical tasting of one of their wines for the wine media. Last year it was their Shiraz, this year it was their Rhône Blend, Full Circle, which is their top red flagship wine. It was a most excellent and very interesting tasting. It is so educational to see how the blend matures with time and to pick out the really good years and learn why they were so good from the winemaker, Dewald Heyns. He has been with Saronsberg for all these years and the 2004 was the first wine he produced for them.

It was held at the Cape Grace Hotel. We tasted impressive vintages, starting with the current one and working back: 2013,12,11,10,09,08,07/06,05 & 2004. This was then followed by lunch in the restaurant accompanied by some of these wines. Do you ever go to eat at this hotel? You should. Read on

Dinner on Queen Mary 2      Last year, we were absolutely delighted to be invited on board by Cunard for lunch. This year, we were invited to have dinner in the celebrity Chef Todd English’s restaurant. We joined a small group of people and had a drink in one of the pubs on the ship and were then taken on a tour of the ship which is huge and very luxurious. Then it was time for drinks on the deck, to watch the sunset and, finally, to enjoy a really good silver service dinner. Read On

Pinotage and Biltong Festival at L’Avenir     This was the first time this festival had been held and, because it was such a huge success, selling out the 600 tickets allocated and in fact more than 200 more, they will definitely be repeating it. The good news for those of you up country is that they will to take it to Johannesburg soon. All the Biltong was provided by Joubert and Monte and on payment of your entry fee of R150 you received a good wine glass (to keep), a book of 12 vouchers for small tasting portions of the different flavours of biltong and a small bamboo container in which to put the biltong. There was a good selection of excellent pinotages to taste, although we missed some of our favourites. You could buy a cheese and paté box from L’Avenir or Joubert & Monty had braais going and you could have a boerewors roll for R30, a chicken prego roll for R40 or the full tutti: a Rump steak platter for R70. We had a ball. Read on

Bartholomeus Klip for a quiet overnight stay     We met Lesley Gillett of Bartholomeus Klip at the recent Groenberg Festival and they went on to our mailing list. We were delighted when they invited us to come and stay and write about Bartholomeus Klip. We spent Sunday early evening, the night and Monday morning there and it is a lovely place to completely relax and chill out. Everything you need is provided in this small country house on a farm in the Swartland. It also has its own private nature reserve and game drives come as part of the cost, as do all meals. The only extra is wine. It reminded Lynne very much of English country house weekends and certainly is attracting lots of British and other nationalities, who return more than once to be spoiled. Read On

This week’s recipe     We had a lovely light pea soup at Bartholmeus Klip and thought you might like their recipe from Chef Louise Gillett, which they very kindly sent to us today. I am pretty sure that when peas are out of season, you can use small frozen peas or petit pois.

BARTHOLOMEUS KLIP PEA AND MINT SOUP

Knob of butter - 1 tablespoon olive oil - 2 fat shallots, chopped - 1 stem celery, finely chopped - 600ml vegetable or chicken stock - 400g fresh peas (1 kg in pods) - Salt and freshly ground pepper - ½ 20g pack mint, leaves only roughly chopped - 4 tablespoons crème fraîche, thick double cream or low-fat yoghurt, to serve

Melt the butter with the oil in a large saucepan over a medium heat. Add the shallots and celery, season, cover and sweat very gently, without colouring for 15 minutes or until completely soft.

Add the stock and bring to a gentle simmer, then add peas, remove from the heat & add the chopped mint and purée. Push through a sieve if you want a very smooth finish. Taste and adjust the seasoning.

Serve in small bowls, hot or chilled. Garnish with a swirl of cream or yoghurt, a sprig of mint and lots of black pepper, accompanied by a few curls of Melba toast.

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

22nd 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.

PS If a word or name is in bold type and underlined, click on it for more information

Phones: +27 21 439 3169 / 083 229 1172 / 083 656 4169

Postal address: 60 Arthurs Rd, Sea Point 8005

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.

We apologise if MENU caused your phone to bleep in the early hours. To send to our huge list of subscribers takes a long time and many of them receive it in the middle of the night. Might we suggest that your phone should not be activated to receive messages from us or from other sources in the witching hours? If your boss needs to contact you at that time, (s)he’s intruding on your valuable personal time.

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.

This electronic journal has been sent to you because you have personally subscribed to it or because someone you know has asked us to send it to you or forwarded it to you themselves. Addresses given to us will not be divulged to any person or organisation. We collect them only for our own promotional purposes. We own our mailing software and keep our mailing list strictly confidential. If you wish to be added to our mailing list, please click here to send us a message and if you wish to be removed from our mailing list, please click here to send us a message.

Bartholomeus Klip in the morning

Coffee, tea

and muffins to get us started before the morning game drive

The dining room, ready for breakfast

Daniel, a hard working man who waits at table and also doubles as a very well-informed game guide.

He took us round the Elandsberg Private Nature Reserve in the Land Rover

Early morning mist cloaks the mountains

Hunt Africa has a disease free Cape buffalo breeding project on the Elandsberg reserve

Quelea rising from the grass, where they were breakfasting on seeds

A secretary bird looking for his next meal

We startled a steenbok ewe, which suddenly appeared out of the grass

The track into the misty mountain

Leucospermums are everywhere

Bontebok, the image of Cape Nature Conservation

Another secretary bird

Then back to the farm to visit some new twin baby lambs

before breakfast, with a magnificent selection of preserved fruits

fresh fruit

and cereals

Something naughty, oats with a generous layer of caramel and chocolate

Cheese, figs, cold meats, stuffed eggs and croissants on the sideboard under a Carol Mangiagalli painting of the farm

Lynne's eggs and bacon with tomato and mushrooms
(and very good coffee)

Johan had a delicious bacon and cheese omelette

Then it was time to hit the road back to Cape Town, 1½ hours away, with a last look at some steenbok

who ran away

over the hill and across the plain

RETURN TO MENU

© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2015

Bartholomeus Klip afternoon and evening

We met Lesley Gillett of Bartholomeus Klip at the recent Groenberg Festival and they went on to our mailing list. We were delighted when they invited us to come and stay and write about Bartholomeus Klip. We spent Sunday early evening, the night and Monday morning there and it is a lovely place to completely relax and chill out. Everything you need is provided in this small country house on a farm in the Swartland. It also has its own private nature reserve and game drives come as part of the cost, as do all meals. The only extra is wine. It reminded Lynne very much of English country house weekends and certainly is attracting lots of British and other nationalities, who return more than once to be spoiled. http://www.bartholomeusklip.com/

Twin sisters Lesley and Louise Gillett work at Bartholomeus Klip. Lesley is the manager of the farmhouse, and draws on years of experience in the hospitality industry. Louise is the head chef, who has honed her skills in some of the top restaurants in South Africa and the United Kingdom.

We learnt a lesson on Sunday afternoon. We rely far too much on GPS and when you are in the country you need to expect it not to work. We learnt that is essential to print out directions sent to us by the people who invite us. Google maps sent us to a Denel munitions factory and no one in the area knew where we were supposed to be. The phone at Bartholomeus Klip has been cut off for a week so we were in a bind. Luckily we found an informed shopkeeper in Hermon (he has only been there for about 2 months!) who could direct us and we found it, eventually. They are prevented by the authorities from putting a sign on the R44 (WHY?) so if you go you need to look for the Bo-Hermon sign and turn off there.

A few kilometres down the road you come to the entrance to the farm and the Elandsberg Private Nature Reserve which runs from the gates right up to the Elandsberg mountains in the distance

Our bedroom (the Nerina) was comfortably furnished with a mix of classic Victorian and modern furniture, screens on the windows, a ceiling fan and air conditioning. It has a very comfortable modern bed

The en suite bathroom is large and has a shower over the bath

We were invited to "Take Tea" in the lounge

where we found a splendid spread laid for us
In the interests of good journalism, we did sample a few cakes and other delights with our tea and coffee

Cucumber sandwiches, the best and lightest scones, caramel chocolate cakes and the lightest and crispest apple tart ever were laid out on the buffet. This is a daily occurrence and is included in your room rate

Next door is the bar which works on an honesty system; you write what you have taken in a book and help yourself. You are billed at the end of your stay

Next door to that is the conservatory dining room which is very light and airy. Breakfast, brunch and dinner are all held here and all are included in the room rate

Another lounge to relax in and there is also a TV lounge and a desk with a laptop for the use of guests

Very lush gardens surround the Victorian house which has a covered veranda on two sides

This is where we sat early evening for sundowners and they brought us, and other guests who joined us, platters of smoked salmon blinis You pay for most of your drinks but all the food is part of the deal

The covered veranda facing the garden

The veranda and the conservatory dining room from outside

It is also a working farm and these are some of the cattle pens

They have a large dam and you can take out canoes and boats should you wish to. There are good walks around the farm

A lovely view of the Groenberg over the dam

Wonderful views and lots of birds to see

Walking back to the house

A house by the dam and the boat house where the kayaks are stored

Looking across to the nature reserve

Magnificent mountains

Is this Bartholomeus Klip (stone) ? The farm was established in 1705 by Frantz Joosten van der Lubstadt and his vivacious 24-year-old wife Maria Mouton who settled there against the foot of the Elandskloof Mountains. It is named after the St Bartholomews Day massacre of the French Huguenots in 1572

The swimming pool

Walking back to the Farm house

One can laze in the sun by the pool

Smoked salmon blinis served with sundowners

Help yourself to sherry before dinner, or chose some wine to have with dinner

All the wines on the winelist are local to the area

The dinner menu on Sunday 19th April

The dining room ready for dinner

Specially made charger plates

The house chenin blanc is a wooded wine made by Mullineux. A little too much wood for our palates. We started with a glass each

The twice baked cheese soufflé to start

Romantic candlelight
The excellent minted pea soup followed

Perfectly cooked rare fillet of BBQ beef on a pumpkin risotto with a mushroom veal jus was delicious. We found the caramel pinenuts a bit sweet with the meat. We ordered a bottle of Saronsberg Provenance Shiraz to accompany the dish. John’s came without mushrooms, as requested

A chocolate mousse topped with a nutella sorbet surrounded by a chocolate vanilla custard with added sugared pumpkin seeds for texture.

The drinks tray should you care for an after dinner drink. It has lots of really good South African port, liqueurs and alcohols plus some imported essentials like the Cointreau. They also serve local craft beers

.......To be continued next week
(the pictures from the next morning)
or

RETURN TO MENU

© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2015