It’s in the distant past now, so I unfortunately can’t remember much detail (that’s my advanced age for you), but the general standard of food was excellent. The waiter was attentive and friendly without being clingy (important in such a small venue) and the chef was pleasingly cheery when he came out to see how the food was going down. Slightly short, slightly round, very smiley. :)

I think there were mussels, Camembert, and mushrooms for starters – nummy!
Main courses were Sole with parsley lemon butter (gentle and subtle and cooked to perfection), Springbok with mixed berry jus (great red flavours to match the red meat), Confit of Duck (Jess, comments, as our resident duckspert?) Beef Fillet Bordelaise (good cow!).

There were five of us, so I’m sure I’m missing some things.
Like the stir fried veggies that are served as sides instead of the standard meh creamed spinach and fries. Very tasty.

Om nom nom!

The food is rather a fun combination of nouvelle and pub: intense sauces, interesting flavour combinations, but with the portions approximately twice the size of somewhere like Aubergine, and the main course comes standard with roast potatoes and vegetables. We all overate horribly. Starters were substantial in themselves; I had spring rolls, slightly fatty but tasty, and the EL’s deep-fried camembert was perfectly done, a great improvement on the slightly stringy one we had at the Hussar. (Owing to my somewhat dilatory approach to this reviewing thing I can’t remember what anyone else had, but I’m sure they’ll chip in in the comments).

Main course enabled me to pursue my current goal of trying all the possible versions of duck in Cape Town in search of the perfect one: this was crispy duck in an orange sauce, very flavourful, with the kind of crispy skin that really requires one goes at the bones in one’s fingers. Other main courses at the table included, if I remember correctly, some sort of game in a chilli chocolate sauce, and a giant chunk of lamb shank – the usual ritual of fork-swopping was observed, and it was all very good.

We had to try dessert, despite being full, because the ice-cream offerings were so unusual. I had a brandysnap basket arrangement with berry ice-cream, somewhat delectable, but I think the chilli and honey nut ice-cream sandwich was even better, with wonderful flavour contrasts and a subtle bite.

If I have anything to carp about it was possibly the service, which was pleasant but slightly slow. This didn’t really matter, as it suited our relaxed mood perfectly.

Eck supplied the quality bubbles: actual French champagne.
There may have been other bottles too, but it’s all a bit of a blur now…
:-)

Jo made the starter: a whole Camembert each, topped with finely chopped garlic, then a thick layer of honey, then chuck gently place the whole lot into an oven for a bit.
Same basic recipe as A Holiday Brie.
Damn, they were good!
The garlic goes nice and crunchy, and sweetens up.
Definite Nommage of the Om variety, and one to do again.

Jess did the main course: Fillet of Beef Chasseur.
Nummy! The meat was cooked to perfection.
I ate so much that I almost exploded at the table.
(We had the left over meat on sammiches the next day – the overnight marination did good, good, things to the meat.)

Jess also prepped a dessert: crepe suzette.
Unfortunately, we were all too full to have any.
(This worked out well, as it happens: we had them for breakfast the next day!
Also, check it out: crepesuzette.co.za)