Yesterday our new total of Restaurants offering a Food and Alcohol Delivery and Collection Service in Cape Town and the Winelands reached 660, with 4800 members in the Facebook Group which I created at the beginning of May, when the introduction of Level 4 allowed restaurants to open for the Delivery of Food, boosted from 1 June by restaurants being allowed to sell alcohol and to offer a Collection Service from their premises at Level 3.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/261165661682371/?ref=share
South Africa is two months into Lockdown, 62 days of restaurants not being allowed to open to serve sit-down customers. For the past 27 days many restaurants have reopened, operating within the Government regulation of offering a Food preparation and Delivery Service. On the eve of Restaurants being allowed to offer a Delivery as well as a Customer Collection Service from Monday 1 June, I looked at what the 2019 Eat Out Top 10 Restaurants are doing currently in terms of keeping their Restaurant brand names visible, and generating income to cover their costs and to employ some of their staff again.
Restaurant industry on its knees’ dramatically writes the Financial Mail in a story headline this morning, presenting a picture of doom and gloom about our South African restaurant industry, one which has seen tough times since winter a year ago, a poorer 2019 summer and festive season compared to the years before, not being allowed to open their restaurants for Take-Away food production or delivery, and likely to be one of the last industries to be allowed to reopen in what President Ramaphosa called a ‘phased-in’ approach to opening up businesses within the Lockdown, about which he will reveal more in his sixth speech to the nation tonight. 
As a restaurant writer it is interesting to me to observe how our country’s leading chefs are coping with the Corona Virus lockdown. Ten out of ten to the chefs giving unselfishly to their communities. Less impressive are the chefs trying to raise monies for their staff or selling vouchers to cover their cash flows. Surprisingly few are using the captive audience of Lockdown diners to communicate with them!