IT’S A MAGICAL place, north of Sir Lowry’s Pass on one of South Africa’s less-travelled routes, high up the slopes of the Helderberg with a fantastic view of False Bay that stretches to Cape Point in the distance. The Idiom tasting room and restaurant at Da Capo Vineyards is home to some impressive reds, including a good Cape Blend and Bordeaux-style
HOWZAT! In a survey conducted by The Inside Guide, 38 of the best chefs in South Africa were asked where they like to eat in Cape Town and surrounds when taking a break from their own restaurants. Voted ‘favourite winelands experience’ experience was Overture at Hidden Valley on the slopes of the Helderberg in Stellenbosch, with the nod for ‘best
KUDOS to Franschhoek estate La Motte for winning an international award in the 2018 Tourism Challenge run by the Drinks International magazine of the UK. The category: Best Food and Wine Matching Experience. And it’s not the first time that they’ve achieved this accolade. The judges were impressed by the ranking of Pierneef à La Motte as one of the best
YAY! AND YET! It was great to hear that there are a couple of new venues to choose from come lunchtime in the winelands of Constantia. Not so great was to discover that at one of them they don’t sell any wine to accompany your meal, and at the other the management is somewhat cheeky… At the Nest Deli on Constantia
FOR THOSE who’d like to hear from the person behind Top Wine SA… If you want to listen to a little of what the man has to say about the site – or perhaps you’re just curious as to what he sounds like six years after the launch… Wine critic Carrie Adams of the fine wine and spirit merchant Norman
WHERE to go for an interesting plate of food, a decent glass of wine and a relaxing ambience come lunchtime in the Elgin basin outside Grabouw. Well, there’s The Pool Room at Oak Valley, and there was Fresh at Paul Cluver… And/but just opened is SALT, taking over from Fresh, with the promise of the best in the district when
According to the critics who wined and dined unannounced and paid for their meals before the 2017 Eat Out Mercedes-Benz Restaurant Awards were presented, the following are the best restaurants in the winelands of South Africa, i.e. on the farms, among the vines, rather than on the high streets or back roads of the towns and villages that punctuate the Cape winelands. The emphasis
EAT OUT, “South Africa’s Best Guide to South Africa’s Best Food”, might well come in for some flack after publication of their 2016 Restaurant Awards sponsored by Mercedes-Benz – only one restaurant from outside the Western Cape cracked the nod for a spot among the Top 10 and only three among the Top 20. Respected restaurant critic and publisher of Platter’s
SAO BENTO da Vitoria Monastery in Oporto, Portugal, was the venue for the 2016 Great Wine Capitals Global Networks’ Best of Wine Tourism Awards, the culmination of a competition entered by 359 wine estates from South Australia, Rioja in Spain, Bordeaux in France, the Cape winelands, Rheinhessen in Germany, Mendoza in Argentina, Porto in Portugal, Napa Valley in the USA and
IT’S A LOVELY drive through the countryside to the vineyards of Slanghoek Valley. Visitors typically head out along the N1 highway, taking the R101 to Rawsonville just east of the Du Toitskloof Pass/Huguenot Tunnel (or via Worcester) before turning north along ‘The Route Less Travelled’ than most others in the Cape winelands. It’s alongside the Slanghoek Road in the Breedekloof that the
THE DINERS Club World’s 50 Best Restaurants Academy has included La Colombe at Silvermist in Constantia among their Top 100 for 2016. At No. 76, according to the Academy, La Colombe is the top-ranked restaurant in the winelands of South Africa – second only to The Test Kitchen (ranked No. 22 in the world) at the Biscuit Mill in Woodstock as regards the best restaurants in
SMALL POINT BUT… Why have a menu at the home of such South African marvels as Beyerskloof Pinotage, blends including the country’s ‘indigenous’ variety, and the Pinotage burger, that lists some items in French, Italian, etc? However, moving right along… The Red Leaf Bistro is one of the hotspots on the Stellenbosch wine route, particularly since the restaurant was revamped and the range of
THERE ARE fine-dining tables indoors with artworks on the walls, but the views from the verandah of a reed-lined dam and the Helderberg are difficult to resist! The new restaurant destination on the Somerset West wine route that is 95 at Morgenster is not the place for a simple plate of grub and a glass of any old vino. This is a
IT WAS ABOUT TIME! Long overdue, you might say… By far and away South Africa’s leading producer of fortified dessert wines over the past 30 years or so and with a reputation for great-value quaffers too, Nuy Winery east of Worcester had made do with a rather humble cellar-door tasting and sales facility until the new showcase venue, restaurant and deli opened
THERE ARE VERY FEW successful wines of the serious kind which don’t have a place to call home. Until recently, Bellingham was virtually such a brand – a lovely collection of wines in The Bernard Series and a few other ranges that also have interest value, but if you wanted to go for a tasting or purchase from the cellar door it was
ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW about the better restaurants, picnics and braais in the winelands of South Africa, i.e. on the farms, in among the vineyards, rather than in the cities, towns and villages. And with the emphasis on TOP – each table, bench or blanket given the nod of approval in the country’s leading restaurant guides Eat Out and Rossouw’s, and/or situated next
THE AWARDS and recommendations in the 2016 editions of South Africa’s leading restaurant guides Eat Out (c/o Mercedes-Benz) and Rossouw’s (by Diners Club) are a great help in flagging the country’s best places to wine and dine. Combine these with what’s offered at the Top 100 Cellars and you have pretty much the closest you can get to a definitive ‘who’s who’ in the
ACCORDING to the restaurant critics commissioned by Italy’s ‘Fine Dining Waters’ S Pellegrino and Acqua Panna, the best in the world in 2015 is Spanish, there aren’t any French restaurants currently quite good enough to warrant inclusion among the planet’s Top 10, and of South Africa’s finest only two are rated exceptional enough to make the cut when it comes down to
THE RESTAURANT critics are largely in agreement… The top dining venue in South Africa for 2014 is The Test Kitchen at The Old Biscuit Mill in Woodstock, Cape Town, with Luke Dale-Roberts the chef-owner and Wayve Kolevsohn the somellier: third Restaurant of the Year accolade at the 2014 Eat Out Mercedes Benz Awards, 5 Stars at the 2014 Rossouw’s Diners Club Awards, one
WHERE TO EAT in the winelands of South Africa, at a winery, among the vines? Here are the best tables in the countryside when wine-routing in the Cape – all on farms associated with highly rated reds or whites, bubblies or desserts as recorded on Top Wine SA. Where indicated, the restaurants have earned particularly good reviews in the country’s restaurant guides Eat Out and/or Rossouw’s Restaurants,
