Cape Town Restaurant Tour Part Deux: Dejeuner Au Jardin

La suite from previous post

Saturday was a most glorious day and after a quick breakfast, we headed out to the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens, situated on 528 hectares of land (the cultivated garden is only 36 hectares) and dedicated to growing indigenous South African plants.

We walked though the centennial camphor trees planted by the previous owner of the property the gardens sit on, Cecil Rhodes, that most voracious of real estate "investors". We eventually made our way to the top of the garden to admire the view and were greeted by some guinea fowl. That's not what we had for lunch though.

After our stroll through the gardens, we decided to drive to the Vineyard hotel, 5 mns away, to have lunch at one of their restaurants called Au Jardin, of course overlooking their magnificent garden.
Au Jardin
+2721 657 4500
http://www.vineyard.co.za/

We decided to order some classics to start. S and I believe that to do familiar dishes well is a sign of a good restaurant. When our Caesar salad with poached egg and anchovies served with cheese croutons arrived along with the avocado and shrimp cocktail, we knew we were in for a real treat.

I normally hate shrimp cocktail. The larva-sized shrimp smothered in mayonnaise with the sweetness provided by ketchup is usually hard to swallow. So I had to be assured that this would be special, the shrimp would be detectable. And special it was! There was just a thin veneer of mayo on the shrimp and you could really taste how fresh it was. It's avocado season here so that was a wonderful addition, not to mention the blini it came with. The salad also showed signs of restraint as it was not drenched in Caesar dressing. It was full of flavour, fresh, all around yummy.For main course, we had the absolute best Mozambican prawn in a curry and calamari with tomatoes, black olives and capers on focaccia. The curry was incredibly delicious without being heavy and overwhelming. S said the calamari tasted as if the chef invented tomato sauce. I knew what he meant as soon as I took a bite and felt the tanginess hit the back of my jaw.

For dessert, I ordered an orange souffle but ended up sharing Sim's pineapple and ginger pudding which was absolutely divine. It was gooey but every so often you'd bite into a tiny bit of fresh pineapple.We absolutely loved Au Jardin and can not wait to go back as soon as we get a chance.

Cape Town Restaurant Tour Part 1: Manolo

Eating our way through a long weekend in the Cape

Cape Town is often described as one of the most beautiful places on our continent, perhaps in the world. It also has a high concentration of great restaurants. My husband and I recently spent a long weekend there eating our way through a number of places. Some, we had heard and read about. Others, we happened upon.

We started our "tour"with dinner on Friday night at:

Manolo

30 Kloof Street

+2721 422-4747

http://www.manolo.co.za/

We had heard and read about a lot about Manolo as one of the hipper, cooler, etc...places. The restaurant is set in a beautifully restored house, age: 180 years; and boasts a renowned chef and nice staff members. We generally do enjoy the ambiance brought about by a beautiful decor and discrete music but ultimately, the proof is always in the pudding.

Because I ordered the ZAR200 (~US$27) 5 course meal, we ended up with 4 starters, some of which were quasi-repeats:

• corn soup with prawn ice cream
• line fish tempura with shiitake mushrooms with ginger and almond froth
• glazed scallops with kingklip tempura with turnip puree and grapefruit froth
• shiitake mushroom terrine with pea mousse and you guessed it! ginger froth

Do you detect a tiny bit of irritation in my tone? You are quite perceptive since this is what I would deem abuse of a technique en vogue (copycat or hommage to a great chef?). The corn soup was light and smooth, the mushroom terrine very flavorful, the scallop docile but the omnipresence of froth was sincerely annoying. In case, you believe that I am overreacting, let me jump to dessert where we had a pear mousse, light as a summer breeze, but accompanied by more froth. Surely, less would have been more. To re-balance the mood though, I do have to swear allegiance to my husband's dessert: the chocolate trio of chocolate fondant, chocolate ice cream and truffle. In that case, less would not have been more.

Before dessert was served, we did eat our main courses which were preceded by a guava gazpacho to clear our palate (of what exactly? Please send me the answer if you do know). This was some form of smoothie made with delicious, refreshing guava but I guess calling it smoothie would have taken away some of the panache so delicious gazpacho it is.

For main course, we had a most down-to-earth chicken with mashed potatoes and duck with risotto. Both were quite good but the chicken covered with cracked peppers beat the duck. The mashed potatoes had the richness of true comfort food and a great prelude to further comfort provided by the chocolate trio.

Overall, Manolo was a good start to our Cape Eating weekend but there was definitely more to come!