Stellenbosch

As I previously said, on Friday we traveled to Stellenbosch which is about an hour's drive from where we were in Cape Town.  We are staying at the Stellenbosch Hotel (http://www.stellenboschhotel.co.za/) which is in a great location in town, with many cafes and restaurants within just a few blocks of us.

Unfortunately we made a poor choice in where to eat on Friday night, as Dad and I got food poisoning.  Upon further investigation, we've found out that Cape Town Fish Market is a chain and other people have had less than stellar meals there as well.  Basically, avoid it if you want to get to your wine tastings the next day.

So Jack and Mom got to enjoy the wineries on Saturday, visiting 4 of them (one was just for the olive oil tasting).  I'll just transcribe what she wrote for each:

* denotes that someone liked the wine significantly more than the others

Rustenberg
- Sauvignon Blanc
- Unwooded Chardonnay
- Wooded Chardonnay
- Red Blend (Shiraz heavy), young
- Bordeaux Blend
- Cabernet Sauvignon

Thelema
- Sauvignon Blanc
- Mountain Red
- Sutherland (their other winery) Pinot Noir 2010*
- Thelema Merlot
- Thelema Rabeluis, big flavor, Jack purchased *

Tokara
- Olive Oil

Ernie Els (Most Corporate)
- The Big Easy, Shiraz 60% Cab 20%
- Merlot
- Cabernet Sauvignon 2009
- Proprietor's Blend 2009

View from one of the wineries, even if you don't drink you should visit just for this

Dad still wasn't feeling great last night and Mom wasn't hungry, so Jack and I went across the street from our hotel to this tiny little restaurant called Cafe Lafayette (Facebook page) for something light.  And then I looked at their menu.  After browsing through the selection of handmade pasta dishes, I settled on the ravioli filled with sage and ricotta that was topped with a cream and bacon sauce.  Needless to say, it was rich and delicious.  Jack had a calamari steak simply seared with some lemon that he said was wonderful.  I would definitely recommend this place for its cozy atmosphere and well thought out menu.

Our wine tour didn't start until afternoon today, so I naturally had to go to a bakery to get something to snack on beforehand.  Mom had seen this little hole-in-the-wall earlier, so we went to check it out.  Die Oude Bank Bakkerij is definitely a small place, but as we were walking in loads of people were running out with the bread so we knew it had to be good.  I got a fresh made sandwich that consisted of Black Forest ham, mozzarella, spinach, sun-dried tomato, and pesto, which was freakin' amazing.  I ended up not being able to finish the sandwich, so I'd definitely say that two people could go there and split a soup and sandwich for a light lunch.

My sandwich and a cup of pear and orange juice. Delicious

This afternoon, we had three more wine tastings:

Delaire Graff
- Cabernet Franc Rose 2010
- Sauvignon Blanc 2010
- Coastal Cuvee Sauvignon Blanc
- Shiraz 2009
- Botmaskop 2008
- Cape Vintage Port 2008

Tokara
- Shiraz 2009
- Cabernet Sauvignon
- Director's Reserve Red 2007 *
- Cabernet Sauvignon 2002 *

Muratie
- George Paul Catz Pinot Noir 2009
- Merlot 2007 *
- Cabernet Sauvignon 2007
- Ansela van de Caab 2008 (Bordeaux Blend) *
- Shiraz * (Both Jack and the Jylkka family bought bottles of these last two wines)

Note: [It seems that many of the wineries here are having trouble holding onto their younger bottles (that is, choosing to sell them before they're ready to drink), so many of the wines we were served at the tastings were about 6-18 months too young.  This may explain why not as many of the wines grabbed us.  If many of these were left to maturity, we're sure that they would have been much more appealing.]

My personal favorite winery was Muratie for several reasons, first and foremost that I enjoyed more of their wines than any of the other vineyards that we visited.  It also had a very nice ambience (for my tastes at least) and was the least corporate.  Our wine waiter was the most engaging and had an actual conversation with us during the tasting which was much more appealing than the way some of the larger tastings were being run.  They also had the coolest way to carry wine around that I have ever seen.

Now I know what to do with my old tuba case

That was basically our weekend in Stellenbosch.  We also walked around the town a few times, which was very pleasant during this nice weather (although it is very funny seeing people bundled up in winter coats when the temperature is in the mid-60s).  Tomorrow we're flying to Johannesburg, and from there we will be going to Pilanesberg on Tuesday for some safaris.  I may not post for a few days if nothing of note happens.

Peace

Simon's Town, Wine, and More Great Food

On Thursday Raymond picked us up to take us on a drive down to Simon's Town to see more penguins.  The weather wasn't quite as nice that day, so when we stopped off on the side of the coastal road to get more shots of the penguins we felt like we might get blown off!

Actually had to pull out the warm weather gear for the day

Raymond definitely had a destination in mind to warm us up, with a winery right off the mountain! With very little arm-twistiing, he convinced us to stop for a tasting (the first of many to come on this trip).  This particular vineyard is called the Cape Point Vineyards, and it was promoting the plight of the Leopard Toad through its line of Splattered Toad wines.

I guess I can drink to the toads (or almost anything for that matter)

I guess this is as good a place as any to address this, since I am sitting in wine country as this is being written.  We will be visiting many wineries and doing many tastings, but I will not being going into detail about specific wines.  While my knowledge of wine is greater than the average college student, I probably couldn't comment on too many of the particulars behind the wine.  Instead, I'll try to write down and then post the lists of wines that we try.  You can then go to any of a multitude of online databases and look up the wines if you feel so inclined.  Two of those that I can think of off the top of my head are Wine Spectator (http://www.winespectator.com/) and Snooth (http://www.snooth.com/) which also has a pretty cool photo-based app for the iPhone.

After the winery, Raymond brought us to the Black Marlin (http://www.blackmarlin.co.za/) for a wonderful lunch.  The prawns I had were some of the best of the week.

They really need to start leaving the heads on prawns back in the US

This restaurant would also make a great location to whale watch while eating a great lunch, as it is right on the water and has ample outdoor seating.  The only downside to sitting outside might be the uninvited guests, which Raymond has observed at this restaurant:

I wonder what they order

This was followed by a trip into Simon's Point to see more penguins!

This guy was very photo friendly!

Wondering if the water is warm enough yet

On the drive back, Raymond did a little more arm-twisting and got us to go to another vineyard.  I can't remember the name of this one, but after 5 reds that were all about 6 months to a year too young it was pretty hard to differentiate between any of them.

As for dinner, we went back to the Greek Fisherman (http://www.greekfisherman.co.za/) for another wonderful meal to cap off our week in Cape Town.

I'm going to miss these oysters

I won't do a separate post on today, since it was relatively uneventful.  Raymond brought us to a small Muslim cafe that served a great Malay-style curry, which is definitely a meal to seek out while here.  Then we traveled to Stellenbosch (wine country!), which is where we'll be staying for the weekend.  Tomorrow, we have a tour of 5 wineries planned and then 3 for Sunday.

Definitely time to crash, peace.

Museums and a nice Italian dinner

This is going to be short because we just ate a huuuuuuuuge dinner at the same Greek place as the first night (the Greek Fisherman) and I'm about to crash.

On Wednesday we actually just stuck around Cape Town and went over to the Museum Mile.  We started at the Holocaust Museum, got a quick tour of the synagogue next to it, and then went over to the slave lodge.  Sounds like a really light-hearted day, huh?  But everything was very well done, with educational movies in both museums.  I would highly suggest visiting this strip of museums for a lazy day around the city.

Unfortunately we had a pretty mediocre lunch.  We went to Mama Africa, which we knew to be a touristy place, but we figured it wouldn't be too bad for an off-season lunch.  The service was very slow (slower than the normal pace of over-seas restaurants) and the food was mediocre at best.  Dad didn't have anything good, but at least Jack's chicken liver appetizer was fairly good.  Basically, don't go here if you like your taste buds.

After we got back to the hotel, Jack took a siesta, so Mom, Dad, and I walked down to the beachfront again where the surf was going hard.  The waves were trying to soak some of the joggers in certain places, and succeeded once or twice.

For anybody wondering why I can't smile in pictures, can you see the resemblance? 

That night, we stopped by Giovanni's Deliworld (no website, just google it) which is the most wonderful little deli/small grocery/espresso bar on the main strip.  Mom's been getting her cappuccino from them every morning, and I can attest to their awesome espresso.  But last night we were there for the deli.  If you need your fix of italian meats and cheeses, you must go here!  The woman behind the counter was very generous with the samples and had an enthusiastic knowledge of everything in her case.  If you don't want deli, they have a vast selection of prepared meals that they'll heat up for you, and they looked quite delicious.

Our dinner spread

After chowing through some salami, jamon, porchetta, a few meat pies, and some delicious wine, we were all ready to pass out.  Then someone mentioned gelato, so we went down to the gelateria on the corner and had a few scoops.  Nutella spread on top of hazelnut gelato is sinful, but so good!

I just realized that I haven't said where we are staying in Cape Town.  We are at the Dale Court Guest House (http://www.dalecourt.co.za/), where Sofia (one of the owners) and her staff take wonderful care of us.  They have a full complimentary breakfast every morning that includes fresh eggs (none of the runny or over-cooked crap you'll find in an American continental breakfast), bacon, sausage, cereal, the best orange juice you'll ever have, fresh fruit, delicious yoghurt, and bread.  It is right across from Cape Town Stadium and is in a perfect location to walk down to the waterfront or the beachfront (during the day of course).  Taking a taxi to or from the waterfront from Dale Court is only around R20 (less than $3!!) for four people, if you use the right service.  Use Sport Taxi (021 447-4444) and you won't get screwed out of your money.

Okay, so it was a bit longer than I expected. I'll post more tomorrow.

Peace!

Hermanus, Shacklands, Sushi

Sorry for not posting anything yesterday, I know I've gotten behind but we've been running around a lot and sometimes its just nice to come back to the hotel and crash.  I'll see if I can bring things back up to speed by putting up a few posts today.

Anyway, on Tuesday we met up with Raymond, our driver and tour guide for this leg of the trip.

He took us down to Hermanus, a town along the west coast of the southern tip of the country.  The main attraction here is the whales and there's actually a whale festival that will commence at the end of September and last into the beginning of October.  While we didn't come during the festival, we did get to see a few whales as we walked along the shore and on the drive back up the coast.

Whale doing a "handstand"

Group shot in Hermanus

We also had a nice lunch right on the beach, with lots of seafood and some amazing oysters.  I feel like I've done a disservice by not mentioning the oysters yet.  We got the oysters for the first time at the Greek restaurant the first night and have had at least a dozen everyday since then.  The oysters back in New England are usually pretty good and make a great appetizer, but Jack and I have agreed multiple times that we could easily get a couple dozen each and just make a meal out of those!  They're sweet, briny, and by far the best oysters that I've EVER had.  They taste like the ocean without being so overpowering that you can't have more than a few.  If there's one thing I've had on this trip that will make me come back, it has to be the oysters! (I'll put up pictures of them in a future post because as usual they're gone before I think to get out the camera)

On the ride back up the coast we had an interesting encounter.  As we were driving along, the car came around a corner and this guy was walking along the barrier toward us.

The head honcho

Following him were about a dozen other baboons ranging from babies (who were wrestling in the middle of the busy, windy, coastal road) to ones just smaller than him.  Apparently they're very quick at getting in and out of cars to steal food from people, as Raymond warned us (and I'm pretty sure this was directed at me) to not open the windows.

On the ride down to Hermanus, Raymond had pointed out some shacklands, which are similar to shantytowns that used to exist (and in some cases still do) in the States.  Essentially, when the laws in ZA changed to allow free movement, people started building this little shacks (probably no more than 16 sq ft) on top of one another to form townships.  On the way back to Cape Town, Raymond took us into one of the older townships called Khayelitsha (ki-a-lee-sha) and it was a truly amazing and moving sight.  With a population of more than 2 million people, this informal city has an amazingly well formed infrastructure for people in such poor conditions.  The government supplies basic amenities such as electricity and water to the people for free, but we also saw satellite dishes attached to the sides of the houses and BMWs parked out on the streets.  The people are able to buy the land that they live on for very little (about R2500, which is less than $400) and run businesses along the road that provide services ranging from car washes and hair salons to cell phone shops and car repairs.  Most of these shops were sponsored by large companies such as Coca-Cola or the local cell service providers.

One of the more common businesses that we saw were the meat shops.  Basically, a group of people buy huge bulk quantities of meat (it look like it was mostly goat) and bring it to these various meat shops where nothing goes to waste.  Everything gets grilled and is then sold to the other residents for very little.  Essentially, nobody was going hungry, and while the standard of living is very low by our standards there seemed to be a general contentment throughout the township.  Education is increasing, people are finding ways to make money, and the government is actually stepping in to help in useful ways.

Children in Khayelitsha smiling for the camera

When we got back to Cape Town that evening.  We decided to pick up a few more meat pies and a couple bottles of wine to tide us over until dinner.  And I finally got a picture of some of the pies!

Spinach and feta pies (my personal favorite)

The chicken and the steak and kidney pies

After this light snack (or at least that's what we keep tell ourselves) we went out for some sushi at Willoughby's (http://www.willoughbyandco.co.za/) and it was pretty fantastic.  Jack and Dad started off with the oyster shooter, which was made with sake instead of the traditional vodka.  They tried to get every last drop out of the bottom of the glasses, so I'm assuming that they enjoyed it.  After enjoying some of the traditional sushi rolls, along with some very delicate gyoza, we got their two most popular special rolls, the creamy rock shrimp maki and the rainbow reloaded.  While both were great, I found that the rainbow roll needed some sort of crunch factor in it just to mix up the texture.  The maki was the hands-down favorite of the night, with a nice crunchy tempura batter shrimp sitting on top of some wonderful maki.  This roll provided a nice little punch at the end.

All-in-all, Tuesday was a pretty packed day.  I'll write up the post about yesterday a little later, so stay tuned!

Peace

Meat Pies and Fork

We kept hearing about these meat pies that we just had to get while in ZA, so when were were in the grocery yesterday and spotted them we decided to grab some for lunch.  They come in a variety of flavors such as beef and kidney, pepper steak, and spinach and feta (not meat, but still my absolute favorite).  They are essentially filo dough that has been heavily buttered and stuffed with the various fillings.  I'm ashamed to say that I forgot to take pictures of them (they went so fast!), but since we've had them for an afternoon snack the past two days I'm sure there will be another opportunity to capture their buttery awesomeness on camera.  By the way, paired with a few bottles of red wine, they definitely call for a small siesta afterwards!

After yesterday's afternoon snack Jack, Dad, and I walked down to Beach Road (Mom opted for the siesta) to check out the park right on the waterfront.  Every time I visit a new city, there's something that draws me to it and makes me want to live there, and this was it.  The beach itself has boat lockers to store your sea kayak, the parks are large, open areas that would otherwise be difficult to find in the city, and the walk down the beach front is great for viewing the sunset.

Cape Town Stadium

Dad and Jack on the beach front

One set of a series of statues along the parks

 And now for last night's restaurant review.  Since we made a late lunch of the meat pies, tapas seemed like a great idea for a light dinner.  Well, that was our pretense at least.

We pulled up to Fork (http://www.fork-restaurants.co.za/) and immediately saw that the table in the window was for four.  This table also happened to have very comfortable leather sofas as the seats, so we were already hooked.  We took the waitress' (who also happened to be the manager) suggestion and each ordered 2 dishes to start with, and she ensured us that they would come out staggered. Our courses were the following:

Round 1:
Deep fried goat's cheese with sun-dried tomato biscuits and port and onion marmalade
Grilled tiger prawns wrapped with pancetta
Raviolione with ricotta, spinach and a poached egg served with sage butter and chilli
Roast pork belly with a mustard and parsley crust

Round 2:
Oso buco braised on borlotti beans with gremolata
Roast chicken on fondant potatoes with curry sauce

Round 3:
Moroccan meatballs
Marinated lamb cutlets with a creamy spring onion and cumin sauce

Everything was absolutely wonderful, but a few of the dishes stood out.  The undisputed winner was the raviolione with ricotta.  This dish had the most complex development of flavors on the tongue, and the fact that the chef managed to soft poach an egg inside the pasta just blew us all away.  In the words of Anthony Bourdain, we are most definitely egg sluts.  There were two contenders for second place, the pork belly and the lamb, and that was split 50/50 across the table.  The pork belly was creamy and unctuous, while the lamb was perfectly cooked with a large portion of fat left on that I've never seen in the States.  Our waitress brought over the dessert menu, but we instead decided to go with Round 4, with a repeat of the raviolione and the lamb.  Again, I'm failing as a food blogger since I forgot to take pictures of each dish, but I did manage to snag the lamb on the second round.

Our wonderful waitress presenting the lamb (yes, we got two servings of it each round...)

That should whet your appetite a bit.

More tomorrow!

Peace

Robben Island

Robben Island is a 12km (circumference) island that was used as the prison facility during apartheid during the latter half of the 20th century.  Leaders such as Dr. Robert Sobukwe and Nelson Mandela were held in this facility during this dark period in South Africa's history.

Sobukwe in his solitary confinement cell. He was not allowed to have any contact with the other prisoners during his 9 year internment

The tour was very well run and informative.  It was split up into two sections, a bus tour around the island and an on-foot tour through the maximum security prison.  Besides Jack's wonderful neighbors on the bus, who also serenaded us during the prison portion, the entire tour was very enjoyable.  This is a must-see for anyone visiting the city, and is definitely something that could be done on a poor weather day.

Jack enjoying his bus ride next to the screaming baby

Our tour guide through the max security prison. He was held here from 1980 to 1991 for trying to blow up a building with a bazooka

The hall of the max security prison. Lots of history here, very eerie 

On the main road into Robben Island, I saw the following sign but was very disappointed that there weren't any penguins running around the island on the tour.

And then I saw this little guy on the way out. He and his friend were basically posing for pictures and let us get within 2 ft of them.

"What the hell are you looking at?"

Cape Town: First Impressions

We've been in Cape Town for two nights, and I don't think there's anything to complain about so far.  The first day, we just walked around to (attempt to) ward of the jet-lag.  The waterfront looked enticing, so we headed down that way and naturally found ourselves sitting down in a Greek seafood restaurant after Jack and I agreed that the menu looked far to good to pass up.

An all-too-familiar pose: studying the menu

Dad's seafood soup

Mom's calamari

My seafood pasta

Jack's seafood platter, fit for a king

That was yesterday, and we did more today but I'm extremely tired and about ready to pass out so I'll let everyone know about that in a later post. For now here are some pictures of the landscape around Cape Town, I definitely want to take a few hikes if the weather cooperates.

Devil's Peak

Table Mountain, which we'll hopefully be rappelling off of

The hill behind our hotel (couldn't find the name), with the Lion's Head poking out from behind it

 I'll try to get time to post more tomorrow.

Peace,

Andrew