The Sweet Service Award goes to the Palms Market, and its co-ordinator Isabella Niehaus, for her generous Valentine’s Day gift of a box of figs, olive breads, charcuterie, and cheese, all produce from her market traders.
Tag Archives: Palms Market
Fabulous food feast at Bella Niehaus’ #LangTafelopdieDuin in Langebaan!
On a rainy wintry day last Sunday I and 21 other food lovers were lucky to enjoy a most fabulous five-course food feast at the seaside home of Isabella Niehaus in Langebaan, called the #LangTafelopdieDuin.
Bella is a most enterprising person, having established the Palm’s Market at the Palm’s Centre, she and many of her stallholders bringing the platteland to the city every Saturday. I met Bella there, and she has always been extremely friendly and welcoming to me. Bella also does food styling, assists others to write books related to food, and seems to be on the go continuously. She does one #LangTafelopdieDuin per month.
I had seen photographs of previous #LangTafelopdieDuin lunches at Bella’s house,
and the location of her home and view from there looked impressive. The rain held off until we arrived in Langebaan, and Bella’s directions were perfect in finding her home. No matter that it was grey, overcast, and cold, there was such lovely warmth in the collection of guests which Bella had assembled around her long table, set up in the seafacing room with a fireplace, and open plan to the kitchen, where Bella spent most of the time. She seemed in her element, and was not distracted by guests chatting to her, and photographers capturing her dishes from every angle. She had only one assistant helping her with the food preparation and clean-up, a collection of guests Continue reading →
Camps Bay Promenade/Palms Centre Sweet Service and Tonquani Lodge Sour Service Awards!
The Sweet Service Award goes to the Camps Bay Promenade, the Palms Centre, and Rosetta in The Woodstock Exchange, for their proactiveness in countering the Stage 2 loadshedding for Woodstock, the city centre, Tamboerskloof, and Atlantic Seaboard last Saturday. The Promenade in Camps Bay has just installed its generator (the four Kove Collection restaurants in the building had already installed their own generators), while the Palms Centre also has a generator. Rosetta in The Woodstock Exchange was organised, having pre-brewed its coffee, but was not available with foam! All other coffee shops and eateries in Woodstock, The Fringe, Tamboerskloof, and Camps Bay could not offer coffee nor breakfast between 10h00 and 12h00. It is a surprise that a centre such as The Woodstock Exchange does not yet have a generator, given the severity and regularity of the loadshedding! Continue reading →
Kamers food and design market builds on history of The Castle of Good Hope, first time in Cape Town!
On Thursday I was invited to the opening of the Kamers food and design pop-up event, which is being held inside and outside the extensive The Castle, an apt venue as The Castle of Good Hope was home to the market in Cape Town in early days.
Kamers started off in Stellenbosch twelve years ago when a collection of friends organised it as Kamers vol Geskenke, and its timing was close to Christmas, allowing one to buy unusual, unique, and stylish presents to give as gifts. At that time they started with 40 stands, now they have 140, chosen out of a list of 600 applicants, we were told by the founder of the event, Wanda du Toit. Her official title is Creative Director. Other members of the organising team include Magdel Kemp, Amelia van Zyl, and Hesta du Plessis. Kamers has never been held in Cape Town, so hosting it in the city as well as in The Castle is a double historic event. Now Kamers is spread over four events throughout the year, in Stellenbosch, Pretoria, and for the first time in Johannesburg and Cape Town this year. It is organised by a team of twelve, and no one ever leaves, said Wanda. Unique to the Cape Town event is the collaboration with the Cape Craft & Design Initiative (CCDI), a collective of 5000 small design and craft enterprises, which are offered business and marketing support to assist them in growing their businesses, to help them grow, and to enable them to employ staff, said Erica Elk, its Executive Director. World Design Capital 2014 has endorsed Kamers.
On arrival at The Castle, we were guided to park furthest from The Castle building, and fill up the space in this way, not making sense at all, the latecomers being lucky enough to park closest to The Castle building! It was difficult to find the venue for the media launch, a number of us entering the building housing the William Fehr Collection. An Iziko Museums staff member was unfriendly in pointing us generally down a passage with her walkie-talkie, without explanation. 
She had no clue about Kamers taking place on the property, or where the media function was, and fortunately a colleague could guide us to a completely different building. In the launch address Wanda hinted at some of the issues they had in using The Castle buildings, being a Military-owned property with rules and regulations, which created some challenges for the organisers, but these were not visible to us, other than the attitude of the Iziko staff and the parking ‘organisation’. I fed back the problem with the Iziko Museums staff to Calvyn Gilfellan, the CEO of The Castle, who told me immediately that the Iziko Continue reading →