Bosman's
Grande Roche Hotel, Plantasie Street, Paarl. Tel: 021 863 5100
The Grande Roche, that little piece of genteel Bavaria in... well, Paarl... is a marvellous hotel, with sumptuously renovated suites and a noted restaurant, Bosman's, which I've known since it first opened its doors in the early 1990s.
There have been some subtle changes. The hotel has moved on from Relais & Chateaux, of which it was a member for many years, and has thrown in its lot with the Mantis Group. I'm not suggesting this means much at all, although the old, clinical service has loosened up a little.
On a recent visit we had, in particular, a wonderful sommelier who hailed from New Delhi, which was an interesting counterpoint to all the Teutonic perfection. He was all charm and knowledge and I found myself deeply engaged with his choices of wines, every one of which matched each of eight courses fabulously well.
Yes, eight. It was supposed to have been a six-course gourmet menu, but ambitious chef Roland Gorgosilich was keen to show off even more than the promised sextet, so sent out two more courses.
Roland was deputy to Frank Zlomke, who died just over a year ago after being at the helm of the Bosman's kitchen for many years.
Now, out of that sad circumstance, comes a chance for Roland to shine in his own right, and his food, judged by this gourmet menu, is well fit to grace the elegantly clad tables in Bosman's gorgeously draped and chandeliered dining room. There were good sauces, imaginative touches and plenty of evidence of professional technique.
Gorgosilich's foie gras raviolo with foie gras foam, red cabbage salad and onion-port marmalade was a perfect marriage and, like everything else, gorgeously presented. The minestrone broth with kingklip crepinette had a lovely clarified intensity of flavour. I especially loved the crayfish, with its elegant watercress purée and a topping of shredded apple salad.
The sole meat course was served beneath grand silver domes. After a very Grande Roche countdown ("Sree, two, von!"), they were lifted to reveal the tiniest morsels of beef looking quite distraught, like wayward sons banished to the wastelands of vast white plates. When I say I was disappointed with this dish, I mean only that it was so delicious that, despite it being one of several courses, the minuscule portion was a cruel taunt. The palate told the brain it was great and the brain promptly replied: "Well then, where's the rest of it?" It was a duo of beef with braised root vegetables and dumplings. I think the dumpling was that itsy-bitsy round thing trying to escape from a dab of sauce.
My notes tell me that the additional courses were an intriguing pea sorbet with Parma ham and the more memorable slow-cooked egg and bacon. Yes. An egg, just an egg, from a chicken, like other eggs, had been cooked for three hours, and you really needed to see the expression on my wife's face when they told us that.
I get the idea of, say, veal or pork being cooked sous-vide (think boil-in-a-bag but at almost non-existent temperatures, cooked for ever and ever - all the more pretentious chefs are doing it). But an egg?
It looked and tasted pretty much like a poached egg, yet was notably wobbly, with a sort of jellified softness, as if the chef had read it the riot act before it left the kitchen and it was desperately trying to regain its composure. All of which could have been improved upon if it had been panfried in butter, sunny-side up, for a minute or two.
I was so captivated by this most heroic of eggs, if only for the knowledge of its extraordinary forbearance, that I have no recollection at all of the bacon.
Waterkloof
Sir Lowry's Pass Village Rd, Somerset West. Tel: 021 858 1491
And so, to Waterkloof, perched high up on this wine farm near Sir Lowry's Pass, with the most remarkable winelands view I've seen in a while, incorporating mountains, vineyards and the glistening blue sea of False Bay.
It's an exciting venue for its design. Enormous windows make the most of arresting views, but there's also a lounge-bar flanked by an open kitchen and floor-to-ceiling windows onto the working cellar, where we watched grapes being brought in and destemmed while we ate. That alone makes this an exceptionally good choice for showing off to visitors.
Happily, the food well matches such high expectations. The chef is Gregory Czarnecki, who is undoubtedly one to watch.
This was another show-off tasting menu and everything that reached the palate was as exquisite as the exceptional presentation, from the amouse bouche of goat's cheese mousse, with radish and Granny Smith apple, to asparagus risotto (including shaved ribbons of asparagus, great idea), the superb springbok loin (pictured) with deeply flavourful roasted aubergine and eggplant "caviare" and the finalé of poached peach in vanilla syrup with subtly flavoured koeksister ice-cream (flavoured by immersing koeksisters in milk) and cinnamon "espuma". (Enough with all these foams, guys - they're not nearly as interesting as you seem to think. Outside of an espresso, foam is best left floating on the sea.)
The exception was the plain, rather dry Cape salmon, although its salad of shiitake mushrooms, mango and red cabbage with a spritzy white balsamic dressing was great.
Great food, Gregory Czarnecki. If I were the Dale-Robertses and George Jardines of this world, I'd be looking to my laurels right now.