Tag Archives: Leopard’s Leap

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 18 June

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and news headlines

*   ‘People love our country and continue to visit South Africa‘, said President Jacob Zuma in his State of the Nation Address at the opening of Parliament last night. He set our country’s tourism target at 15 million visitors per year by 2017, with a revenue of R125 billion generated.

*   TripAdvisor is testing amongst a sample of American hotels a new Question and Answer service on listed property pages, so that guests can request further information before they book, including  for example questions such as the cost of a mini-bar, availability of tickets to attractions at reception, opening times of the pool, etc.   Other travelers and the property can answer the questions. Hotels in the same town are not allowed to answer about another hotel in the discussion forums.

*   Much admired and liked Eat Out Top 10 Chef Jackie Cameron from Hartford House is leaving the KwaZulu-Natal hotel at the end of July, to open Jackie Cameron’s School of Food and Wine in Hilton in January next year. Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 17 June

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*   Women business travelers want to ‘feel safe, comfortable, empowered, and pampered’, says an American research report. About 50 % of business travelers are women, and they control up top 85% of business travel expenditure.

*   Actress Claire Danes is in Cape Town for the filming of the fourth season of the TV series ‘Homeland’. She and her husband have been spotted eating at Harbour House in Kalk Bay, dining at The Test Kitchen, shopping at the Biscuit Mill, and walking down Kloof Street, near Yours Truly.   Cape Town is doubling up for ‘both Istanbul and Turkey‘ (sic)!

 *   Chenin Blanc was praised by Greg Sherwood of Handford Wines in London, at a tasting of Chenin Blanc and Pinotage wines, organised by Wines of South Africa (WOSA). Sherwood led the Chenin Blanc tasting, and said about the varietal:  ‘Chenin is a massive and unique selling point for South Africa.  It has a variety of styles and gives you a Burgundy textural experience without having to pay Burgundian prices. The days of too much oak and batonnage are now in the past. These practices have Continue reading →

‘Cook Franschhoek’ heats up Franschhoek this weekend, getting back to cooking basics!

Cook Franschhoek 3A number of Franschhoek’s top chefs will pair their delectable dishes with the wines of the local wine estates at ‘Cook Franschhoek’, running from 13 – 15 June, sharing their special cooking tips, reflecting the food trend of getting back to basics.

Spread around the wine estates and restaurants of Franschhoek, the participating chefs will allow workshop participants into their domains, and share their cooking secrets, while the winemakers will guide the attendees on choosing the most suitable wines to pair with each dish made.  At the end of each workshop, the dishes cooked and the wines paired will be available to taste.  It also allows one to interact with the chefs and winemakers in small groups, and to ask more specific questions.

The participating Franschhoek chefs subscroibe to the cooking basics, such as ‘snout-to-tail’ food usage, meaning that every piece of an animal such as a pig is used (such as witnessed on MasterChef SA Season 2 when Chef Chris Erasmus of Pierneef à La Motte cooked a pig’s head to make a terrine); sourcing ingredients fresh from the farm to the table, within close proximity to the restaurants; smoking meats, charcuterie being the speciality of Chef Neil Jewell of Bread & Wine; cooking over a fire, including a rotisserie, a Green Egg, and Weber; and Nordic cooking techniques of pickling, fermenting, and preserving. Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 9 May

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*  L’Huguenot, a joint venture between Leopard’s Leap and Yangzhou Perfect, sold 1,5 million bottles of wine in China last year.   A cheaper varietal is planned for 2015, which could double the sales of the brand, according to Leopard’s Leap MD Hein Koegelenberg.

*   Brands Krone Borealis and Krone Rosé, and brand owner Vinimark, have been left red-faced after Die Burger disclosed that its 2010 MCCs in fact were not Cap Classiques, and have been removed from retail shelves due to the two brands misleading consumers.  Winemaker Rudiger Gretschel explained that the 2010 vintage bottles started exploding during fermentation.  With the help of Robertson Winery, the content of the remaining bottles was decanted and re-bottled into stronger bottles.  The 2010 vintage is now being sold with the Twee Jonge Gesellen label, at almost half the original price.  The Méthode Cap Classique Association of South Africa is reported to be outraged by the incident.

 *   Bouchard Finlayson is sponsoring the Tollman Bouchard Finlayson Art Award 2014  Tondo Competition for the Hermanus FynArts Festival, taking place from 6 – 16 June.  Each of the 40 art Continue reading →