Bar: Orphanage
Address: Corner of Bree and Orphan streets, Cape Town
021 424 2004
Twitter: @OrphanageClub
Cocktail: More Tea Vicar?
Price: R55
Ingredients: Finlandia vodka, rooibos syrup, cranberry juice and lemon juice
Brand spanking new, but you would never say. Orphanage pays homage to a bygone era of the early 20th century, taking its name from Orphan Street, which was apparently called that because of orphan children of the city who used to gather there in the early 1900s as they were fed by the priest of St Paul’s Church on Bree Street, the Rev SW Lavis.
Raymond Endean, the “house master”, owner and manager of Orphanage, makes the dainty More Tea Vicar? by building it in a glass first: first a bar-prepared rooibos-infused sugar syrup, then bar-prepared vanilla-infused Finlandia vodka, then lemon and cranberry juices. This is shaken with ice and strained into a flowery teacup on a saucer. The drink is garnished with a bubbly froth, a tapped mint leaf and a rooibos jelly cube in a teaspoon on the side. The cube acts as a palate cleanser.
The drink is quite herby and a bit like tea. The foam is a pretty touch. The drink is a sweet treat but don’t be fooled by its daintiness; it does have a decent alcoholic kick.
R15 from each sale of this drink goes to the St Francis Children’s Home in Crawford, Athlone – a home founded in 1919 by Lavis.
The present priest, Archdeacon Karl Groepe, blessed the bar at its opening last week and had a More Tea Vicar?
Endean says: “Orphanage harks back to the drinking dens of the early 1900s, offering an extraordinary theatre of cocktail alchemy, an unpretentious, sharing food menu and a remarkable and rich history from our vibrant Mother City.”
Smoking areas are outside front and the back deck.
A fun facility at the bar is its wooden bottle drawers below the DJ’s decks. If you buy alcohol by the bottle, you get an assigned drawer with a key to store it while you are at the Orphanage.
Orphanage is open seven days a week from 5pm until 2am and from 3pm on a Friday for tea, supper, dinner and dancing. – Weekend Argus