The Sweet Service Award goes to Carrol Boyes, for its extreme generosity in delivering to my home a collection of their Carrol Boyes products as a Christmas gift. I had only got to know the company and some of its executives this year when it launched its wonderful chocolate boxes. They are a kind, friendly, and approachable company. 

Yesterday I received a letter from the lawyers of Chef Peter Tempelhoff of newly opened FYN Restaurant, reacting with threat and intimidation to my Blogpost dated 28 November, about being banned from his restaurant, which opened on 30 November. Some speculate that the banning is a cheap publicity shot by Tempelhoff, to fill his 40-seater restaurant, and that the lawyer’s letter is a follow-up to his marketing strategy, to attract further attention to the restaurant.  (more…)

The new restaurant with a mouthful of a name to open at Constantia Fabrics, Ellen Jay Purveyors of Fine Food, Baked Goods, Pickles & Preserves, is a new Eatery operated by seasoned restaurateurs Len Straw and Johan de Villiers, operating within Constantia Fabrics.  It adds a new touch of class to food offerings in the Constantia area, which I visited for the first time on Saturday 8 December.  (more…)

Three weeks ago I and a group of writers was invited to enjoy breakfast at the new Tintswalo at Boulders, perched above Boulders Beach in Simonstown, renowned home to the African penguins. Shortly after our visit, we were invited by Five Star PR to spend a night at the luxury boutique accommodation lodge, directly overlooking Boulders Beach. I chose to stay on Saturday evening 8 December, having to be at Stargarden in Fish Hoek for a reading from my second book ‘SwitchBitch: My Journey of Transformation in walking the Camino, Sole to Soul’ the following day. (more…)

It is an exciting achievement to have published the second book in my SwitchBitch trilogy, entitled ‘SwitchBitch: My journey of transformation in Walking the Camino, Sole to Soul’, following in the footsteps of SwitchBitch Book 1, which I launched a year ago. SwitchBitch Book 1 focused on my Physical transformation, in losing 45 kg, while Book 2 is focused on the Spiritual transformation after walking the Camino. Yesterday the Book was presented at a Preview launch at Stargarden Boutique Café in Fish Hoek. (more…)

The Sweet Service Award goes to Shimansky Jewellers in Green Point, and its Carmen Wing, for their good cappuccino making skill, for offering to clean all my rings when I attended a tasting of the new Benguela Cove Cuvee 58, and for the use of the hotspot WiFi of one of her colleagues, as the jewellers guest and staff WiFi was not working. 

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It had been rumoured that Chefs Richard Carstens and Reuben Riffel were starting a joint venture after Chef Richard left Tokara Restaurant, after eight years in its kitchen, at the end of September. Despite requesting both chefs for information about the new partnership since then, the collaboration of the two chefs in the restaurant consultancy RiffelCarstens was only formally announced this week. (more…)

The Eat Out judges have a hard time in deciding on the ranking of our country’s top restaurants, especially when our top restaurants are increasingly performing on international restaurant list rankings! This year they seemed to markedly not have considered the top performance of two internationally crowned SA restaurants, The Test Kitchen, and even more so, Restaurant Mosaic at The Orient outside Pretoria. Both these restaurants have just made the prestigious 2019 Top 200 of the La Liste international Top 1000 restaurant List, rubbing shoulders with the world’s top chefs.  (more…)

good news, hands holding paper with text concept, positive media

It is a week of good news in Cape Town, with the petrol price dropping at midnight tonight, and the Level 5 water restrictions having dropped to Level 3 on Saturday.  (more…)

The pinnacle of fine-dining restaurant openings in Cape Town and the Winelands this year is that of Gåte restaurant at Quoin Rock in Stellenbosch, an interactive 16 course dining experience influenced by Molecular Gastronomy!  Other new restaurants which opened last month are the not-so-fine FYN and The Commissary, the fifth Luke Dale-Roberts restaurant. The Cowboys and Cooks Group has relaunched Sevruga, and opened Cowboys and Cooks Steakhouse & Bar, for owner Michael Townsend.  (more…)