The Sweet Service Award goes to the Waterfront Boat Company, for hosting a group of guest house owners on a harbour cruise on a picture-perfect Cape Town evening, accompanied by Boschendal Grande Cuvee Brut and their Le Grande Pavillon Brut Rosé, and then hosted by Waterfront 221 restaurant, to introduce the Cruise and Dine package which the restaurant and the cruise company have developed.

The Sour Service Award goes to Bird Boutique Café in Bree Street.  It was a first visit, and we sat in the entrance hall at a long table with benches.  A waitress took our order.  It took 20 minutes to bring tap water.  The food order for the second person was not given to the kitchen.  The orange juice had to be re-ordered.   The food was slow in coming from the kitchen.  I spoke to the co-owner Heike Stegmann, having asked for her, and spoke in German to her, out of courtesy to her, as I had read that she was German.  She immediately told me that I could not say “Du” to her, but had to say “Sie”, as I did not know her!   In South Africa most Germans would say ‘Du’, especially as I was older than she.   No disrespect had been intended.  There was no apology for the poor service, but we were told that we should have seen the note that customers must place their own order in the kitchen.  As we were not sitting in that room, we did not see the notice!  The waitress also did not tell us.  The menu was worn and partly torn, and we had a chipped glass in which the water was served.  The owners were in the kitchen, remaining hidden in the kitchen, behind a curtain.  We could not see the “boutique” in the name of the ‘restaurant’, especially with the crates for seating!  We bought 2 packets of home-made lebkuchen biscuits, and they were stone-hard when we ate them at home.

The WhaleTales Sweet & Sour Service Awards are presented every Friday on the WhaleTales blog.  Nominations for the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be sent to Chris von Ulmenstein at info@whalecottage.com. Past winners of the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be read on the Friday posts of this blog, and in the WhaleTales newsletters on the www.whalecottage.com website.