Tag Archives: Woolworths Pantry

Woolworths: Social Media case study on how to build and break customer relationships!

Woolworths is a leading retailer, that attracts a shopper profile at the LSM 7 – 9 level, and has always stood for quality.  Its CEO Ian Moir has had a bad year to date, having experienced the negative power of Social Media three times this year already, the latest furore no doubt given him the biggest headache. There is no doubt that the furore that its employment advertising has created will become an important case study in Social Media Marketing, and will guide many other corporates in how to deal with negative sentiment expressed in Tweets, on Blogs, and in Facebook comments.

My attention to the issue was first attracted when I read a Tweet by Woolworths’ Digital Editor, highly regarded Sam Wilson, who previously was the editor of Food24, Parent24, and Women24, writing as follows: ‘Guys, I am white. I am currently interviewing white people. This @WOOLWORTHS_SA white racism thing because we comply with BEE? Weird’. It came across as a Tweet expressing her displeasure at her employer’s employment policy, and it only made sense when the story broke about Woolworth’s recruitment advertisements specifying population group requirements for the positions it was advertising. The story was launched last week on Facebook and thereafter on the blog of Justin Harrison, who calls himself an ‘Internet entrepreneurial pioneer’ on his Blog, but who has not been heard of by most local social media folk, maybe because he operates from Durban.  It got so bad on Woolworths’ Facebook page that it removed the comments containing ‘hate speech’. Last Thursday Woolworths posted a note on its Facebook wall, announcing that it was closing it down due to the overwhelmingly negative and unbelievably harsh vitriol posted, a move supported by more than 2500 likes (out of 204000 ‘likers’):

“Woolies fans,

Disabling our wall was not a decision we took lightly and not one we’re particularly happy about. But when your page becomes little more than a platform for a well-orchestrated campaign of hate speech, we owe it to our customers not to subject them to such vitriol in our own house.

We have, in a variety of channels, repeatedly refuted the claims being made against us. We have also allowed thousands of comments on our Facebook page, debating the pro’s and con’s of Employment Equity as a national debate… deleting only overt hate speech and comments inciting violence.

However we’ve always put our customers first… and many, many customers have asked us to stop hosting this vitriol. We will re-open our page as soon as we think we can resume reasonable discussion”.

Yesterday the wall was re-opened, and new negative comments have been posted on the Facebook page, where most of the debate appears to be concentrated, with little mention of the issue on Twitter.  Interesting is the vast number of (mainly negative) comments about the Woolworths debacle on a new Facebook page called AAA Anti-Affirmative Action, with close to 3500 likes, reported on by The South African Newspaper published in London, which referred to Woolworths’ and SAA’s employment policy problems. The newspaper also reported in the same article that the ‘National Chairman of the Australian Protectionist Party, Andrew Phillips called upon both the Federal Labor government and the Opposition to unanimously support the introduction of sanctions upon South Africa’.   The sanctions are motivated by Mr Phillips, whom most Australians who posted comments about this story say they have never heard of, on the grounds of the government not having created an ‘equal opportunity’ society in this country.

Earlier this year Woolworths was embroiled in a Social Media war about its vintage soft drink range bearing a close resemblance to Frankie’s, which Woolworths was forced to remove from its shelves after the Advertising Standards Authority found that the retailer’s ‘Good Old Fashioned’ pay-off line was too similar to that of Frankies. Initially Woolworths denied copying any aspects of Frankies’ drinks.  In a third incident, Woolworths was criticised for launching Halaal hot cross buns over Easter, which caused a furore too. The sponsorship by the retailer of MasterChef SA was said to erase the damage which the two earlier Social Media disasters had caused, but Woolworths did not come out of the reality TV series unscathed, its Woolworths Pantry guest food blogger recipes causing controversy initially.

Woolworths reaction to the employment advertising furore, which has led to a call by trade union Solidarity for customers to boycott Woolworths, and which was echoed in the thousands of Facebook comments, smacks of old world corporate disaster management PR spin, rather than being Social Media driven:

*  Posted its employment policy, in accordance with the Employment Equity Act, which applies to all companies with 50+ employees, on its Facebook page on the same day:

“Over the past few days, we’ve been accused of racist employment practices. We’d like to state the facts:

• Like all South African companies, Woolworths has a role to play in transformation. For this reason, SOME positions (where there is under-representation) are designated for EE groups.
• The designated groups are Blacks, Coloureds, Indians, women and people with disability.
• As per the Employment Equity Act of 1998, Woolworths is expected, like all SA companies with more than 50 employees, to plan our workforce by race, gender and disability.

• Our workforce is diverse and includes people of all races (Black, White, Coloured, Indian), gender and disability.

We appreciate the value diversity brings to our business and the need to contribute to levelling the playing fields for certain groups of South Africa’s population”.

*   Sent a personalised e-mail entitled ‘The difference between Rumour and Fact’ to its cardholders, with a similar content, and an sms to those customers who are not on e-mail.
*   Placed an advertisement in the Sunday Times, Rapport and City Press on Sunday, with a similar message.
*   Wrote an expanded version of the content as a letter to the ‘Readers’ Forum’ of Business Report, an odd platform to use to address his ‘Dear Woolworths customer‘, when it was possibly the shareholders he was trying to placate, given the knock that the Woolworths share price has taken in the past week (the letter is the same as the one sent to its customers by e-mail)!
*   Received public media support from Labour Minister  Mildred Oliphant for its ‘unwavering effort to genuinely address transformation in the workplace through the implementation of employment equity’.

In our opinion, the response by Woolworths has been very corporate, very reserved, very defensive, and not in keeping with Social Media marketing principles of engagement and two-way communication, a similar reaction it delivered in the Frankies affair.  One wonders how one Facebook post and subsequent blogpost by Harrison could have unleashed such a storm, his message obviously touching a raw South African nerve amongst the shoppers that make up the bulk of Woolworths’ target market.   Surprising was the blogpost written on the 2oceansvibe blog, which lambasted Harrison for using the Woolworths issue as a means to gain more Followers on Twitter and other Social Media platforms, and writing in detail how Harrison had allegedly bought Followers some years ago. This led to a strong outburst of comments against 2oceansvibe, accusing it of being linked to Woolworths and/or Woolworths’ digital media agency Quirk, defending the Woolworths brand (denied by owner Seth Rotherham), and criticising 2Oceansvibe for pointing a finger at a Social Media player when it itself had been criticised for selling advertising for its radio station on the basis of highly inflated listenership fingers, forcing Rotherham to deny the allegations contained in the close to 200 comments received to the blogpost!

The Woolworths’ website does not explain its BEE employment policy, nor does it contain the public statements made in the media by its CEO in its Careers section or elsewhere on the website.  It clearly has been edited, as its introduction page invites one to click onto a link to see the career opportunities, but when does so, no jobs are listed. Now one is invited to call the retailer to check out its employment opportunities!   Woolworths should use its website proactively to communicate with its staff, potential staff, and customers!

Seemingly sensible advice to Woolworths comes from Harrison: ‘Woolworths is clearly in a spin over how to deal with this issue and they would do well to learn from SAA’s mistake. Issue a public apology and revert back to the hiring policies to be fully inclusive and based purely on experience and ability‘.

For Woolworths specifically, a platform such as Twitter should be used for engagement.  The retailer has become very poor at acknowledging any feedback about in-store problems, expressed by its Tweeting customers.  There is no apology if there is communication, and there is no follow up to communicate with the customer telephonically after the Tweet, as Pick ‘n Pay has become reasonably good at.  A company that once had the Social Media lead has become reactive and defensive, and has lost its standing due to the Social Media wars, rather than walking tall and engaging with its customers in a credible and warm manner. This is a surprise, as its Head of Online Nikki Cockcroft has an impressive background, including CEO of Primedia Online, 365 Digital, and Prezence Digital before she started at Woolworths just over a year ago, and given Sam Wilson’s experience in engaging with a similar target audience at Media24 previously.

Woolworths needs to go back to basics to better understand how to maintain customer relationships via Social Media.  Successfully building up a large army of Twitter Followers and Facebook Likers is no guarantee that the same seemingly loyal customer audience will not turn against the retailer if it is not in touch enough with its customers, and offends them, as the past ten days has shown!

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage

Woolworths’ ‘sustainable seafood’ practice very fishy, misleads customers!

It was episode 15 of MasterChef SA, flighted on Tuesday last week, that attracted attention to Woolworths’ communication about its commitment to sustainable seafood.  The TV commercial matched the reality TV series focus on seafood prepared on the beach at Paternoster, and Chef Pete Goffe-Wood gave a brief introduction to the South African Sustainable Seafood Initiative (SASSI), saying that it educates consumers about buying fish responsibly. Woolworths is one of the major sponsors of MasterChef SA, and joins Robertsons as another MasterChef SA sponsor which is not being honest with consumers.

Chef Pete said that ‘green‘ rated fish is in order to buy, while ‘orange‘ and ‘red’ rated fish denotes fish varieties that are overfished and scarce, and should not be eaten.  The Woolworths TV commercial expressed the retailer’s commitment to sustainable seafood.

It was a visit to Woolworths the following day that made me check out the seafood section at the St John’s Piazza store in Sea Point, where I noticed the following:

*  the dominant SASSI poster about Woolworths’ ‘sustainable seafood‘ supply, using the SASSI colour rating

*   About half the fish sold is kingklip, on the SASSI ‘orange‘ list!

*   The ‘Fresh Fish’ department has fish displayed whole, and pre-packed in portions, and has a mix of such packs with and without the sustainability rating on it!  This is inconsistent per fish type, i.e. some of the kingklip is SASSI colour rated, and other packs are not.

*   The colour blue does not appear on the SASSI list, but the majority of Woolworths’ fish packs have a blue sticker. The Calamari Goujons pack I bought had a blue rating, with the heading ‘Fishing for the future’, which is defined on the pack as follows: ‘Our FISHING FOR THE FUTURE’ initiative is your guarantee that the product is responsibly sourced. Blue indicates farmed or imported‘.  It then provides the SASSI cell number for checking on the sustainability status of a fish type, and depicts and defines a green fish (‘Best choice‘), orange fish (‘Concern‘), and a blue fish (‘Farmed or imported‘)!

At the Canal Walk branch of Woolworths a sales poster attracted attention to a frozen hake promotion, and this carried the MSC logo for being ‘Certified Sustainable Seafood‘. Nowhere in its outlets does it explain what MSC stands for, and how it differs from the SASSI rating, leading to consumer confusion.

We Tweeted about the visible predominance of the ‘orange‘ rated kingklip in the St John’s Piazza store in Sea Point last week, and received the following reply by e-mail from Alana Jattiem of Woolworths (she did not supply her designation): “Thank you for getting in touch with us on our Twitter page. With regards to your concerns, SASSI has requested all retailers to remove labelling off packs, hence the phasing out of on pack labelling by Woolworths. Customers are welcome to check this with SASSI. Regarding your query on Kingklip, Kingklip is orange on the SASSI list not because of the stock status, but rather because of the impact of the fishery on by-catch such as sea birds. Our kingklip is sourced from MSC trawled hake suppliers who make use of highly effective by-catch mitigation devices such as “Torry lines” to scare off birds and thus, to a large extent, preventing them from getting caught. It should be noted that there are fishery improvement projects underway to make the kingklip fisheries more sustainable and from a retailer side we are asking our suppliers to get MSC certification on kingklip which would be a guarantee of its sustainability.  We hope this answers your concerns & questions. Thank you for your support”.

On pressing Alana for further information and clarification of where Woolworths is moving in its sustainable seafood programme, we received the following disappointing reply: ‘Given the changes required around SASSI labelling on product, we are in the process of revising and rebranding our fishing for the future initiative, which will cover certified products from the MSC, ASC, Sassi green label, and registered fisheries improvement programmes and new commitments through to 2015 . Please expect a full press release and awareness campaign in the next 4-5 months’. A third e-mail to Alana to request further clarification more urgently resulted in a non-response.

Given these disappointing replies, not understanding Alana’s cryptic and acronymic replies, and feeling fobbed off by her e-mails, I checked the Woolworths’ Pantry page on their website, which links blogposts to the theme of MasterChef SA week by week. There is no mention of sustainable seafood for week 15, which focused on seafood, and Woolworths’ commitment to it, as communicated in MasterChef SA’s episode 15.

I then checked the corporate Woolworths website, and under the heading ‘Good Business Journey’ found a lengthy statement about the retailer’s plan ‘to make a difference in our communities, our country and our world’, and its commitment to sustainability across a number of different fields (e.g. fibres, business, ecosystem). The company says it has a comprehensive plan to make a difference in respect of ‘transformation, social development, the environment and climate change‘.  On the company’s internal sustainability rating it scored 84% in 2010, it writes proudly. It then goes on to list all its awards relating to the environment, sustainability and responsibility.  There is no mention of its new ‘Fishing for the Future‘ initiative in this section at all, and information appears dated, with awards mentioned up to 2010 only!

At the St John’s Piazza branch of Woolworths the following fish types are sold:

*   Hake – ‘green’ rated

*   Norwegian salmon – some of the packs have no sustainability rating, others are rated ‘blue’ (with the same definition as the calamari above)

*   Kingklip – ‘orange’ rated on some packs, other packs not rated

*   East Coast sole – ‘orange‘ rated

*   Angelfish – ‘green‘ rated

*   Dorado – ‘green‘ rated

*   Yellowtail – ‘green‘ rated

*   Salmon fishcakes – no rating, and type of salmon unspecified in one pack type, and ‘blue’ rated in another pack type!

*  Norwegian salmon slices – ‘green‘ rated (one wonders why it is ‘green’ when its fresh Norwegian salmon is ‘blue‘ rated?

*   Smoked snoek – no rating

*   Mackerel – no rating

*   Snoek and haddock fishcakes – ‘blue‘ rated

*   Pickled fish – ‘blue‘ rated, even though its hake content is ‘green’ rated!

*   Haddock fishcakes – ‘green‘ rated

*   Smoked kippers – ‘blue‘ rated

*   Smoked trout – some packs ‘blue’ rated, others not at all!

*   Frozen lobster tails, half shell scallops, black tiger prawns, and ‘prawn meat‘ packs are all not rated!

*   Lightly smoked mackerel – ‘blue‘ rated, plus has a confusing green logo to show it is high in Omega 3, and a blue MSC certification logo

*   Lightly smoked hake fillets – ‘green‘ rated, and blue MSC logo.

On the SASSI list snoek, West Coast lobster, as well as Alaskan salmon are green rated. Deep-water and shallow-water hake, kingklip, king mackerel (line fished), prawns, East Coast rock lobster (hand collected), Atlantic salmon, sole, and yellowtail farmed in sea cages are all orange rated.  Norwegian salmon, of which Woolworths sells a large quantity, does not appear on the SASSI list.

MSC stands for Marine Stewardship Council, an international organisation that conducts audits of sustainable seafood from catch, to supermarket sales, to restaurant presentation. Nowhere in the Woolworths stores is any information provided about MSC, or is the abbreviation defined, other than two fish types having the MSC eco-label. At St John’s Piazza branch I noticed a second poster, with the three colours Woolworths is using, adding blue to denote ‘farmed or imported, not listed by SASSI‘, being downright dishonest and confusing to consumers in making it appear that ‘blue’ may be a SASSI rating, in that it contains SASSI’s name, cell number, and website address, but makes no mention of MSC! The poster concludes that Woolworths’ ‘fish and seafood is responsibly sourced, legally caught, has full traceability’. This poster is smaller than the one at the top of our blogpost, and is not visible to shoppers buying the pre-packaged fish on the opposite shelf, as they would have their back to both posters!  The staff member at the fresh fish department could not answer any questions, and said she only started working at this Woolworths  branch yesterday!

It appears that Woolworths is at early steps of becoming sustainable as far as its seafood supply goes, and has jumped the gun in creating a TV commercial in this regard, in not being able to practice what it preaches in the ad! It needs to be consistent in labelling all its fish products in store. Fish stock sustainability is not only a South African issue, but also an international one, and therefore creating a ‘blue‘ rating is irresponsible (because it does not exist on the SASSI rating system), and labelling all imported products into this rating is too, as imported fish varieties need to be responsibly eaten too!  It is deceiving consumers to use the ‘blue’ rating, to make them think that it is in order to buy these fish products. While I personally love kingklip, Woolworths should discontinue its supply of this endangered fish variety, as well as all its other ‘orange‘ fish types, in order to remain true to its ‘sustainable seafood’ commitment! Currently it is a fishy and confusing  consumer con!

POSTSCRIPT 3/7: Impressed that Woolworths has called (what a bubbly and friendly media person Babongile is!), and has invited me to a meeting to discuss the blogpost with them next week.

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter:@WhaleCottage

MasterChef SA episode 10: Family budget meal, too many cooks spoil the broth for Samantha Nolan!

It was a less exciting episode 10 of MasterChef South Africa last night, with the challenge to the ten finalists to prepare a family meal within a budget of R150.  The three finalists who went into the Elimination Challenge had to fix a Minestrone soup, and it was Samantha Nolan who had to leave the MasterChef SA kitchen, a shame given her leadership role and her ability to keep a cool head under pressure in previous episodes.

The visit by Abigail Donnelly, Food editor of the Woolworths-owned Taste magazine and editor of restaurant guide Eat Out, added an extra dimension to the tension, joining the judges. The brief was to prepare a family meal for four persons within a budget of R150, but had to be ‘worthy of royalty’, they were told.  The finalists were told by Mrs Donnelly that budgeting is part of the real world.  She said that she would judge the dishes based on taste, they ‘should not be too fancy‘, and they should ‘showcase the beauty on the plate’.  They had 60 minutes in which to complete the dish.  They had to select ingredients from the Woolworths Pantry within the budget limit, but it was evident that none of them had a calculator with them to tally up their grocery cost.  Chef Pete Goffe-Wood had an über calculator, and did the honours for each finalist.  Only Lungile Nhlahla came in within budget.  The other nine finalists had to give up ingredients to make the budget balance, Khaya Silingile being most over budget, at R265!  She admitted that she was a ‘ditz’, having gone over budget. In summary, Chef Pete told the finalists that going over budget would have led their restaurants to go under within 6 months.

Chicken seemed to be the most popular choice for the finalists’ family meals, only Samantha choosing to prepare poached trout (served with Asian vegetables and egg noodles as well as asparagus cream), and Jade de Waal making pork poached in milk (using bay leaves and lemon) served with creme fraiche, salad, parmesan, and pasta, admitting that she may have cooked her pork for too long, and that it may therefore be too tough.  While the finalists were preparing their dishes, Mrs Donelly and the judges discussed how some of the finalists push their limits and show amazing technique.  But she noticed that many do not taste their dishes.  Deena Naidoo made chicken schnitzel with a parmesan coating and mushroom sauce, which was praised by the judges for his delicious farm-style budget within budget. Mrs Donnelly said he made the ‘chicken proud’. Khaya deboned two chicken legs and stuffed them with red onion and aubergine, serving them with corn bread.  The judges were shocked that she would only serve two pieces of chicken for four persons.  She countered that she was challenging the ‘spirit of ubuntu between the chefs in sharing’ her food. Her bread was said to be too salty. Chef Pete said that she had shone in the previous episode in winning the international challenge, but that it had not been in evidence in yesterday’s episode. The chicken lacked flavour and intensity, she was told. Khaya said that she was the only finalist that had not been in a pressure test. Lungile was praised for her ‘rustic family-style’ meal, even though her portion sizes were criticised for being too small. The texture was praised, the polenta had a sweetness, and the chicken was perfectly roasted.  Jade’s salad was said to be creative, and her crispy sage was liked by the judges. However, her pasta was not seasoned, and her pork dish did not work, she was told. She admitted that she did not put out her best.   Thys Hattingh had a very quick review, his parmesan crisp being the tastiest of the whole dish. Samantha’s roasted onions were said to be too robust for the delicate poached trout. Mrs Donnelly said that she was disappointed with the asparagus cream, not really tasting it, and the roasted onions overpowered the dish. Chef Pete said that he would only eat the pasta. Manisha Naidu was highly praised by the judges, being told that she ‘truly has a palate to get flavours right’, said Chef Benny Masekwameng. Mrs Donnelly praised her for a ‘beautiful balanced plate of food’, and her dish was judged to be the best, the care and generosity coming from ‘the heart and soul’.  Mrs Donnelly loved her bottled sauce so much that she wanted the recipe for it.  While the Finalists were cooking, Woolworths ran a fabulous looking ad, inviting one to eat in for four persons, at R150, with chicken, and tiramisu for dessert.  No dishes were shown for Sarel Loots, Ilse Fourie, and Sue-Ann Allen.

The bottom three finalists were selected as Jade, Khaya, and Samantha, and were sent to the Elimination Challenge. Chef Pete brought in a big pot of Minestrone soup that had ‘purposely been ruined‘, and their challenge was to ‘get it back on track’. Chef Pete explained that things do go wrong in the kitchen, and the challenge for a chef is to rectify this.  A table contained bowls of ingredients, and each of the three finalists was given six opportunities to collect ingredients from the table.  They were told that the ‘worst tasting soup‘ goes home.  Samantha commented that the soup ‘looks like dishwater with left-over vegetables’. She selected red onions, butter beans, garlic, tomato paste, and pancetta (Italian bacon), but chopped the pancetta (sourced from Wild Peacock Food Emporium, they Tweeted proudly during the show) into cubes, which Chef Pete said was incorrect, as Minestrone is a meatless vegetable soup. The soup tasted too much of the pancetta. Chef Benny added that Samantha had shown throughout the program that she could not get seasoning right, either having too much or too little. The tomato paste and garlic should have been added earlier by her, Chef Pete said.  Khaya added red onion, garlic, fresh tomato, tomato paste, as well as coriander, which she assumed was parsley.  Chef Pete was critical of the soup in having become a tomato soup, making it more Mexican and less Italian. The judges coughed on tasting her soup, there being too much pepper, but they liked its chunkiness.  Jade identified that the soup lacked body and flavour, and she added pancetta for the flavour (but removed it before plating the soup), garlic, celery, and parmesan.  She was praised for adding and then removing the pancetta, giving her soup a smokiness, Chef Andrew Atkinson said. Chef Pete said that the soup had great balance of flavour, and that her stock had ‘beautiful body’.

Chef Benny was very ‘talkative’ on Twitter during the show last night, and made some funny comments.  He remarked on Khaya’s red lipstick, saying she was wearing it for luck!  He called Manisha the ‘Flavour Queen’ on Twitter too.  Chef Andrew’s blue shirt was criticised on Twitter, and once again many wrote that Khaya should have gone home, given that she did not know coriander from parsley.  Criticised too was that Ilse Fourie’s dishes rarely are featured, as happened last night.

It was Samantha that was sent home last night, and she was told that she can ‘cook with passion, and that no one can take that away from you‘. She said that she ‘will never forget any of it’!

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter:@WhaleCottage

MasterChef SA episode 8: Iconic SA chicken pie dishes Brandon Law and Babalwa Baartman!

What an exciting MasterChef South Africa episode 8 was last night, and what a super theme, focusing on the iconic South African cuisine, which challenged eight of the Finalists in an Elimination Challenge, and saw the demise of Brandon Law and Babalwa Baartman, two contestants who did not receive much coverage in the preceding seven episodes. Cape Town’s tourism industry should have benefitted from the episode too, with beautiful filming in Bo-Kaap, with Table Mountain as a backdrop.

The 13 Finalists were put to a taste test, with 30 small bowls of ingredients placed on their work stations. They were asked to taste an ‘iconic’ Carrot Cake which Chef Benny Masekwameng had baked, and then choose the 15 ingredients he had included in its baking. Brandon said immediately that he did not have a good track record in identifying ingredients, and looked worried. He added that he had made a carrot cake before, but certainly had not added so many different ingredients. Thys Hattingh was excited when he saw the sugar, knowing it was a cake or a dessert, saying it probably was something he had made before. He started with the foundation of a carrot cake, choosing the base ingredients: carrots, walnuts, sultanas, and more. The carrot cake was praised by the Finalists for its aroma, and some guessed that it contained nutmeg, cinnamon, and fruit.  The Finalists had to choose the ingredients they thought were in the cake, the bottom eight Finalists going into the ‘Elimination Challenge‘, they were told.  It was the second ingredient (walnuts) that caught Thys short, and another seven incorrectly chose sultanas, which were not in the cake. Brandon, Ilse Fourie, Sue-Ann Allen, Jade de Waal, Deena Naidoo, Manisha Naidu, Thys, and Babalwa went into the Elimination Challenge as a result. In choosing a cooking utensil, which matched that of a second Finalist, the eight were paired into groups of two, and had to open a Mystery Box, which contained a directive of where to go to recreate an iconic South African dish, each pair driven to a different destination in the sponsor Hyundai’s vehicles.  They were given 4 hours to meet with the maker of the dish, to taste the ingredients, and to feel the texture.  The makers of the dishes were not allowed to tell them the recipes or give any specific guidelines.  The eight Finalists were told that the makers of the ‘worst dish’ would be sent home, a surprise that two Finalists were set to be eliminated.

Brandon and Babalwa were sent to De Volkskombuis in Stellenbosch, where they met Chef Dawid and were presented with his restaurant’s ‘Meraai se Hoenderpie’, his mother having added the dish to the menu 35 years ago, in honour of one of their chefs at the time. They tasted the dish, described the chicken to be ‘moist and juicy’, covered with a thick and crispy pastry. There were no strong spices, but they detected a taste of sweetness.  On their return, Brandon decided proudly that they would not use puff pastry from the Woolworths Pantry, and that they would make it themselves, a decision which was criticised by Chef Pete Goffe-Wood, in that puff pastry takes two days to be made, he said.  Brandon confidently replied that he knows the short cuts to make puff pastry. They cooked the chicken with bacon, to give it saltiness, as well as mushrooms. Again Brandon told the camera proudly that he came to MasterChef SA to ‘push his boundaries’, and that’s why he chose to make the puff pastry from scratch.  As it does, it shrunk in the oven, and exposed some of the meat. The dish therefore did not look as good as that of De Volkskombuis, and Brandon was told that store puff pastry had been used in the making of the dish at the restaurant. The judges said that the filling had dried out due to the pastry not creating a seal, due to it shrinking.  The dish was not cleaned before presentation, as can be seen in the photograph.

Jade and Sue-Ann were sent to Goedemoed Country Inn in Paarl, where local waterblommetjie bredie expert Tannie Naomi presented her iconic waterblommetjie dish in the 1818 Cape Dutch home, which had housed some of the MasterChef SA production crew, its owner Russian Count Kim Nicolay told me telephonically after the show. Tannie Naomi said that waterblommetjies grow in 60 – 100 cm of water, and are an iconic Boland dish. Kim told me that the phone had rung off the hook after the show last night, for bookings of waterblommetjie bredie, but they are not a restaurant. Back at Nederburg close by, the two Finalists chose bay leaves, salt and pepper, sugar and white wine to cook the lamb.  They left the cooking of the waterblommetjies to last, Chef Pete questioning this, but Jade confidently said that they did not want to overcook it for it to become ‘mushy’!  When served to the judges, they said it was a ‘bit green’, and the dish was shot down for the potatoes, lamb, and waterblommetjies all having been cooked separately, instead of being cooked together, the ingredients not ‘having lived together in the same pot’, they were told.

Ilse and Manisha were sent to the Eziko Cooking and Catering School in Langa, where Chef David presented the dish they had feared, being tripe, both never having prepared it before.  Tripe is a traditional Xhosa dish, served to guests to welcome them, Chef David explained.  The two Finalists described the texture as ‘furry’, and ‘chewy’, and having a salty taste.  Initially they seemed hesitant to taste the dish, but realised that their future participation in MasterChef SA depended on it. Back at the MasterChef SA kitchen, they put the tripe into a pressure cooker.  They had to make phutu pap too, and followed the instructions on the pack.  Chef Benny liked the aroma coming out of their pots, but the two Finalists were worried that the tripe was not yet soft enough and also not as brown as in Chef David’s dish. The judges said that their tripe dish had an identical presentation to that of Eziko, and the tripe was judged by Chef Andrew Atkinson to be ‘not bad’.  Chef Pete liked its texture, but Chef Benny said that the pap did not have the right consistency. But he said that the dish ‘blew me away’, saying that the texture and flavours were right, and therefore they were allowed to join the other five Finalists who did not have to do this Challenge.

Thys and Deena were driven to Biesmiellah, the iconic Cape Malay restaurant in the Bo-Kaap in Cape Town, on a glorious day, and Cape Town was shown off in its glory.  They were presented with Denningvleis, the most popular Cape Malay dish that the Indonesians had brought to this country.  It was described as containing lamb and a ‘watery gravy’. They tasted a ‘sweetness’, nuts, and tamarind.  Being furthest away, they had the longest time to discuss their strategy whilst they were driven back to Nederburg.  Arriving back, their challenge was to balance the sweet (with brown sugar) and sour (with tamarind, but which they could not find in the Woolworths Pantry) of the dish. They added raisins, whereas Biesmiellah had used sultanas. When presented to the judges, their dish was said by Chef Andrew to be ‘nearly there’, to look similar to that of Biesmiellah, that the lamb could have been cooked for longer, and that there was a ‘good balance between sweet and sour’, Chef Pete said.  Their dish was judged to be good enough for them to stay on at MasterChef SA.

In the end two teams did not do well: Jade and Sue-Ann did not ‘marry their dish in one pot’, and Brandon and Balalwa did not follow the judges’ brief of replicating the dish they were allocated. The judges reminded the Finalists that this episode had exposed them to the culinary heritage of our country, and that both teams had fallen short in this Challenge. It was their decision to eliminate Brandon and Babalwa in this episode. Brandon said that cooking is the great passion in his life. Babalwa said that she had had an awesome time at MasterChef SA.  From Twitter it would appear that the wrong team was sent home last night, many Tweeting that it was unfair that Brandon was ‘punished’ for preferring to make his own puff pastry instead of using a prepared one.

The remaining eleven Finalists were given a pep talk by the judges, being told that they were a third way through MasterChef SA, and that it was ‘time to shine’, and to ‘reach out and grab it’! They were challenged: Let’s see it’, referring to one of them becoming MasterChef.

POSTSCRIPT 9/5: I popped in at Biesmiellah today, and the manager told me that they have been overwhelmed by the number of calls of Capetonians who want to taste Denningvleis.  One TV viewer came to them straight after the show last night to eat it!

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage