Tag Archives: Hayden Quinn South Africa

‘Hayden Quinn: South Africa’ episode 8: The heart of the Karoo, with leopards, lamb potjie, and sunflowers!

 

Hayden Quinn 8 Potjie and mini-pizzaHayden Quinn covered a large distance in last night’s episode, travelling from Oudtshoorn to Prieska via Prince Albert, and ending off in Hertzogville in the Free State. Farmer Hennie de Bod tried to teach Hayden some Afrikaans sayings, which Hayden wasn’t too bad at repeating.

The 500 km trip in a lovely red new Mercedes-Benz GLA began outside Oudtshoorn, at the Gamkaberg Reserve, where Dr Quinton Martins, the founder and Director of the Cape Leopard Trust, showed Hayden the research camera capturing the movement of leopards, as well as of other wildlife, demonstrating the Biodiversity in the area.  Hayden was made to do a leopard crawl, to get a feel of a leopard’s movement.  Dr Martins has more than 1000 photographs of leopards,Hayden Quinn 8 Leopard Crawl and his research shows that there is an average of one leopard per 100 km².  Then it was onto the gravel road of the Swartberg Pass, which separates the Little and Great Karoo and was built in 1888 by Thomas Bain, which took Hayden to Prince Albert.  Here he only spent the night at the only hotel in town, the Swartberg Hotel and its Victoria Room Restaurant ‘from a bygone era’, Hayden said.  Hayden did not see anything else in the village, which has become famous in serving as the location for Kokkedoor Seasons 1 and 2. Continue reading →

‘Hayden Quinn: South Africa’ episode 7: Cooking with egg-cellent ostriches in Oudtshoorn!

Hayden Quinn 7 Oudtshoorn Ostrich EggLast night’s episode 7 of ‘Hayden Quinn: South Africa‘ was focused on Oudtshoorn, and will attract tourists to the town, now not only known for its Cango Caves and ostriches, but also for the cutest Meerkats!

The episode opened with Hayden sitting in the veld in the Klein Karoo, awaiting the sighting of Meerkat in the Meerkat conservation farm, his guide being Devey of Meerkat Adventures, who looked very Australian with his big leather hat!   The Meerkat are observed on De Zeekoe Guest Farm outside Oudtshoorn, creeping out of their burrows to Hayden Quinn 7 Meerkat Whale Cottagecatch the first rays of sun, to warm up their tummies, to get themselves going to forage for food for the rest of the day, including insects, bugs, and worms.

Hayden went to visit Chef Allister Scharneck of Buffelsdrift Game Lodge outside Oudtshoorn, who taught Hayden how to make an Ostrich Egg Frittata.  The first step was to open the thick ostrich egg shell, which Continue reading →

MasterChef SA Season 3 episode 1: Bootcamp 1 shows angelfish no angel; beautiful Cape Town on the table!

MasterChef SA 3 ep 1 Table Mountain and contestantsI had forgotten how hard it is to stay on top of a new series of MasterChef SA, and last night’s first episode of Season 3 was disappointing in being mainly an hour long tasting of 36 angelfish dishes, for the first day of Bootcamp.  But the tough elimination challenge could not have been held against a more beautiful backdrop than that of Table Mountain, great marketing for Cape Town.  The dominance of Reuben Robertsons Riffel was disappointing, being the new judge.

In the previous two MasterChef SA Seasons, more time was spent in getting to know the contestants, when they had to do basic tests such as peeling  and cutting potatoes, and peeling and slicing onions.  Last night the hot auditions in Cape Town (with Chef Pete Goffe-Wood and guest chef Henry Vigar of La Mouette), in Durban (Riffel with Chef Jackie Cameron, who has just left Hartford House to open her Jackie Cameron School of Food & Wine) and in Johannesburg (Chef Bennie Masekwameng was joined by Chef Andrea Burgener, Continue reading →

MasterChef SA Season 3 hits the pan tonight; first SA MasterChef SA Celebrity on the 2015 menu!

MasterChef SA Season 3 Chefs Benny, Reuben, PeteMasterChef SA fans have been waiting in anticipation for their favourite reality TV cooking show to return to their screens, with the first episode of Season 3 starting at 19h30 this evening.  A new judge is introduced, and the contestants are said to be of a high standard. M-Net has also announced that its first Season of MasterChef SA Celebrity will stir things up for charity in January.

The M-Net media announcement about Season 3 is full of food clichés and fighting talk about how excellent the programme series is:  ‘The contestants are hungry for victory, the Judging panel has been refreshed by the addition of award-winning chef Reuben Riffel, and viewers can look forward to epic culinary triumphs as well as some spectacular gastronomic fails. MasterChef SA Continue reading →