First Anniversary Chills

My Facebook status for today reads:

Vanilla has to take a cold shower. It's her first wedding anniversary. The two are not related.
Posted about an hour ago · Comment · Like


I have to say, it’s not exactly how I expected the day to start. I thought I would be writing a romantic blog post about being married for one year. Some of you may even remember the happy day. Instead D woke me up this morning and said, “Happy Anniversary, Vanilli, and now for the bad news. The geyser has blown.”

Kind of takes all the romance out a girl’s day, doesn’t it. At least the shower wasn’t as cold as I expected. By dint of turning on the hot tap full blast I manage to extract the last few litres of warm water from the ailing geyser and now I sit here waiting for the electrician to arrive. He’s not sure, he said, if he can make it today. I suppose I could have pulled a line about it being my anniversary and oh pleeeeeeese, Mr Electrician.

Google tells me that the first wedding anniversary is celebrated by gifts of paper. I mean what sort of gift would you give someone that was paper? A piece of origami maybe? A paper packet. A notebook. Okay, all offers of notebooks gladly accepted. A newspaper? No thanks. A paper hat? Oh, if you must. But I suppose it might mean books? Of course it must mean books! I sincerely hope it means books! Okay, all books happily accepted!


Which, moving on, means talking about “the book”. Well, the book aka the manuscript, is lingering for a moment. I am thoroughly pregnant with words, fit to explode really, but I have to do more research. So I have my nose buried in volumes on Slavic mythology and treatises on vampirology. I have to say that to some extent it takes the fun out of writing and it does induce nightmares but it is, on the flip side, incredibly interesting. I never realised one could get so wound up about Marx (yes, that Marx) and vampires – you know, the line about capitalism being like a vampire. And there I just thought I was writing a teen-friendly paranormal novel. Ah the layers of life. You’ve got to love it.

And talking about layers and vampires (oh you have to love word and thought association…) – I’m expecting a wonderful feed tonight – layers of flavours harmoniously married together into a symphony of taste... Yumyum! We’re off to La Colombe, the restaurant we went to exactly one year ago – and which has now been awarded the status of best restaurant in SA this year. So lack of hot water notwithstanding, hauntings by vampires aside, I still plan to thoroughly enjoy my first wedding anniversary! Champagne, anyone?!

Food, Glorious Food

There is food and then there is creativity, sex, love and sublime cosmic fusion on a plate. I had the latter on Saturday evening. Oh man! Wow and double wow. It’s not that often one goes out for a meal that leaves one waxing lyrical about the culinary creativity of the chef. But this man worked magic.

The restaurant, Bon Appetit is in Simonstown – remember, I took you there at the beginning of the year. Now I’ve wanted to go to Bon Appetit for a while but given we don’t eat out much (courtesy of my multiple food intolerances and dicky digestive system) we just haven’t got round to it. But Saturday being Valentine’s Day and my system being stronger than it has been in a while, I figured it was time to chuck caution to the wind and indulge. It's been far too long since I've done the gourmet thing.

Bon Appetit’s menu is unashamedly French - the chef being a native of Brittany – and Michelin trained at that. And I love French food – good, proper, real French food in the grand tradition – and this food was that and more - and in a setting that was relaxed and friendly. Talk about melding unexpected flavours, talk about an explosion of taste which somehow, despite its intensity, rolls subtly around your tongue filling your mouth with an experience that goes way beyond “just food”. This was a combination of ingredients that was orgasmic. There is simply no other way to describe it. Like I said, cosmic fusion, sex on a plate. And that’s without even mentioning the presentation.

I started with an Assiete of Marinated Oysters – oh yes, let your tongue drool over that – served with a chardonnay and lemon granité and Portuguese sardines and red peppers in a filo pastry. Each oyster was marinated differently, one included passion fruit and tequila, another had hints of sesame seeds, another was soused with vodka and, I think, balsamic vinegar. Before you think that the flavour of the oyster was killed in all that, think again – the tastes exploded in my mouth and atop them all, singing like a prima donna, was the oyster. Oh yum.

D had a camembert baked in a filo pastry with an apricot confit served with a beetroot and balsamic ice cream. Hmm-mmm. Light, delicate, deep, moreish. Want some?

So, are you guys drooling yet? No? Shame on you!

So to mains… I swear if your laptop or keyboard is not awash in saliva by the end of this post then either I’m a very poor writer and/or you have no culinary imagination!

My main course was the Parmetier de Confit de Canard – shredded duck confit, tender and melting, blended with just a soupçon of foie gras, served between layers of the creamiest potato mousseline with a port jus. As for the presentation, sublime – a work of art in itself. It was daunting to actually stick my fork in and enjoy the food, which left me cooing and oohing like a woman well on her way to an ecstatic heaven via culinary erotica.

D had braised pork tenderloins with a concassée of apple and raisins and crispy crunch crackling – the flavours all married so well and meltingly delicious - a gentle, lyrical symphony of taste.

And then there was dessert. The Vanilla Goddess left all things vanillarish to D who had light-as-air profiteroles with three bean vanilla ice-cream and chocolate sauce, while I had Apple a la Pomme (apple of the apple…) - an individual apple tart, sort of a mini tarte tatin, served with Granny Smith sorbet and cider-schnapps jelly. Just the right level of tartness and freshness after the duck.

What can I say… we went to paradise and I’m not sure when we came back again. All I know is this – I’m going back!

As I said to the waiter, “I think I might just need to nip into the kitchen to tell the chef I want to have his babies.” I don’t think the front of house manager, the chef’s wife, took that too kindly. Still, I’d run out of superlatives by that stage and sometimes you just have to say it like it is!

And then there was the perfect Out of Africa moment. As I was sitting at our window table mooning over the food, I noticed a large grey dog loping along the pavement. The oddest thing was that it appeared to have a smaller dog on its back. As it passed the twinkly fairy lights in the window it struck me… Not a dog but a baboon and its baby! I ask you. Where else other than in Cape Town would you be seated in a gourmet restaurant while a baboon and child strolled past – presumably on her way to the pub to collect her husband – yes I’m sure - given the way she winked at me as she passed by. Well, come on, it’s not that unlikely, is it? When you eat food that is created by sheer magic, why should reality not blend with unreality to transport you to an entirely other sort of realism…? After all, who really knows where illusion ends and begins - and with food like this, does one really care?

Asian Fusion Confusion

Argh. Blerk. Ugh. I don’t know about you but I find that sometimes “fusion” food gets it horribly wrong.

I love Dim Sum and remember first eating them in a little restaurant tucked down a side alley in Dublin. We used to go there at about 11am on Sundays, choose our selection from the trolleys pushed around by obliging waitresses and devour fluffy white clouds of deliciousness whilst sipping Chinese tea. So when I discovered that one of my favourite local restaurants (or what I should say was once one of my favourite local restaurants...) had had an upgrade and was now serving Dim Sum, I was hugely excited. Not put off by the sushi which wasn’t up to par the previous week (it used to be delectable) – I thought, not a problem, I can have their Dim Sum. Ha.

So much for fluffy white clouds of deliciousness or little tokens that touch your heart. After sharing a small selection with D, I was left feeling as though I had a lead balloon, or, if you prefer, a dead baboon, in my stomach – and he was fermenting… I thank the goddess for a gut-saving Traditional Chinese remedy called Bao He Wan aka Relieve Stomach Stagnation.

As for the traditional Chinese tea normally served with Dim Sum, well, I guess the tea-boat from China must have sunk.

"I'm so sorry," I muttered to D who'd never had Dim Sum before, "that wasn't Dim Sum, it wasn't even Asian Fusion, that was complete Asian Fusion Confusion!"

“Did you enjoy your meal?” asked the bright young thing serving us.
“Hmm,” I murmured, “let me just say that that was the most disappointing Dim Sum experience of my life.” And went on to explain what Dim Sum were all about, what they were supposed to have in them, how light they were supposed to be and so on - you know, in the way of the worldly-wise and well-travelled...

As an aside: I don’t know about you, but I’ve learned using the word "disappointing" with service providers is far more effective than using the word "awful". “Awful” hits then over the head like a club and causes them to put up all sorts of prickly defenses. “Disappointing” slips between the armour and slides neatly between the ribs, leaving them defenseless. (Oh yes, I’m getting decidedly and strategically mean as I get older.)

All I can say is that locals going to said restaurant and trying Dim Sum for the first time will be put off for life. Unless they like something which is a combination of vetkoek and dwarf bread* and tastes of nothing in particular. In future I will make my own Dim Sum.

“Ooh,” groaned D, as we drove home, “After all that fusion food I need to be defused.”
Yes, well, preferably not anywhere near me!


* Dwarf bread a product from the Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels is solid, chunky stuff. "It will enable you to survive for days (by making you realise you are surrounded by things that look more edible) and never goes stale, possibly because it was always stale. Its primary use is as a weapon (although it is also used as a kind of currency), and it is made in many different types. Reportedly the process of "forging" a loaf of dwarf bread includes gravel as part of the recipe, and kitty litter is apparently a preferred seasoning."
Source

This is not Dim Sum, or Dwarf bread...

It is, indeed, a cupcake. For those of you who didn't know...