I visited I Love My Laundry a little while ago, and loved it. Because they’re so quirky and different, I decided to write my profile on them, rather than on a random semi-famous person. So, here we are
Walking in to I Love My Laundry from the streets of a bustling Saturday morning Cape Town is like breathing in fresh air. It has an atmosphere of calm, yet it is busy. There is an early morning regular here for coffee and breakfast dim-sum with her sons. Wiechert, the manager, is organising bags of laundry, fixing coffee and steaming dim sum all at once. There is much being done, yet there is not an ounce of frenzy in the room.
This year was much more interesting. I didn’t book for any of the chefs, though apparently the Great Gordon was there. It costs extra, and at R110 for an ordinary ticket, I didn’t have much extra! But even without the extra excitement of live shows, it proved to be an interesting year for the Good Food and Wine Show.
In the season of flu bugs, cold bugs and tummy bugs, UCT seems to have caught the Market bug. Students were lured from all over the campus by scents of boeries and bacon coming from stalls at the Young Entrepreneurs Day today.
The Young Entrepreneurs Day is part of the Postgraduate Entrepreneurship diploma offered by UCT, in which students are required to set up successful stalls on jammie plaza every few weeks. The tasty treats on offer, like brownies, burgers, bacon and egg rolls, boerewors rolls and woodfired pizzas to name but a few, make quite a change to the usual UCT fare of toasted sandwiches, coffee and huge muffins.
I don’t think it’s overstating the fact to say that in this freezing weather, students will do just about anything for a hot meal, and at the amazingly low prices offered by most of the stalls, the most we had to do was face the wind and rain.
The amazing pizza oven in a trailer. Possibly what convinced me to try their pizza
I chose to be brave and wait in the rain for a a woodfired pizza from the Eat Out The Box stall.
Though the rain was cold, the queues long, and the wait for my pizza even longer, the cheesy, salty goodness that eventually followed was totally worth it (especially for just R23!). I vote for more days like today, because, to be honest, I don’t think I’m the only one sick to death of UCT’s boring food!
Every year at this time, Cape Town’s restaurants and home cooks are inundated by demand for carbo-loading, high protein meals. And, as every year, tonight is the big night.
The night before the Argus Cycle Tour, (a bicycle race held annually in Cape Town), is traditionally set aside for bulking up on protein and carbs before the big day. It may not, strictly speaking, be a food event, but food and nutrition are a very important part of it.
There are some very restrictive extreme eating plans around during this period. Low fat carbohydrates and protein, like pasta and chicken breast, are both eaten in vast quantities the night before the race. This is to build up easily accessible energy reserves to aid cyclists while they ride. Not that I would know, I’m not exactly the cycling type, but I’ve heard.
The run-up to the Argus is fairly interesting foodwise. The main run-up even is the “Lifecycle Expo“, which promotes a healthy outdoor lifestyle, as well as healthy foods and supplements. This year, Pesto Princess, a brand that lies close to my heart, won best stand.
Some of the cyclists are foodies and wine connoisseurs, and amusing guides abound, such as Food 24’s “A drinker’s guide to riding the Argus“. Funny as this is, it brings across the point that restaurants and wine farms rely on the Argus to eke out a little more business out of the waning summer tourism (Cape Town has a ridiculously seasonal food industry).
All in all, I’m glad I don’t have to do the race myself, or get up at 4 am to look after cyclist’s kids like a good friend of mine does, but I’ll certainly be doing some carbo-loading myself, you know, just in case!
UCT was flooded with underdressed and thoroughly sodden students today as Cape Town came to the unhappy realisation that, as Ned Starke would say, “winter is coming” (although autumn will come first, we hope).
Although most Capetonians are unhappy with this news, I’m simply thrilled. Autumn means cooler days, soft rain, and, most importantly, the traditional harvest season and festivals.
The harvest has been celebrated throughout the ages, and there are different harvest festivals around the world: in America there is Thanksgiving, in Asia the Mid-Autumn festival, and in the UK, Michaelmas, to name but a few.
Of the harvest festivals, I am most familiar with the Michaelmas festival, which is named after St Michael. The Michaelmas festival is supposed to give courage and light to those who celebrate it, preparing them for the long winter ahead.
Traditionally, a fattened goose was eaten, which would apparently protect the family from financial need for the rest of the year (though how that makes sense, I’m not sure). The rhyme goes:
“Eat a goose on Michaelmas Day,Want not for money all the year”.
This all sounds great to me, but my experience of Michaelmas never included geese! Going to a Waldorf school, I celebrated Michaelmas every year for 17 years, which is a lot of festivals.
For us, they were always about the bountiful harvest, but also about helping those in need to prepare for the winter ahead by donating non-perishable food which would last them at least a while. There was also great excitement as a result of St Michael slaying the dragon (this is acted out each year by the pupils, resulting in much smoke and a few singed eyebrows in the dragon department).
There are a few other harvest festivals around Cape Town, and among those still to come is the Oesfees at Franschhoek’s Solms Delta. This unique festival gives farm workers a chance to celebrate their hard work and bless the year’s harvest with music, food and wine.It takes place on the 23rd of March this year, and tickets are available from Solms Delta.
I’m upset that I will miss this special event yet again (my cousin’s wedding is on the same day) but I look forward to celebrating the harvest in my own way, with good food, good wishes, and a lot of good wine!
For a few years now, Cape Town has been following the worldwide trend of gourmet markets and fresh food and. In the past year or two, however, new markets have been popping up around Cape Town like nobody’s business.
The markets have changed their shape since the early days, becoming more about trends and pre-made food than the fresh produce of the farmer’s markets. This is definitely to do with South Africa’s transformation into what some have called a foodie nation.
South Africans, as consumers, are becoming much more conscious and demanding of the food industry. Many South Africans, especially Capetonians, see themselves as “foodies” (though this term, and perhaps the kind of person who would define themselves as such, is dreaded by most in the food industry).
In an effort to explore the food markets of Cape Town, and try to understand the “foodie”, I visited the City Bowl Market on Hope street.
Opened in 2011, the City Bowl market offers a wide variety of food, drink, fashion and jewellery. It is located in a beautiful old building on Hope Street, and is light and spacious, a pleasant change to most indoor markets – which can be very claustrophobic.
The food and drink that I had was good, but quite pricey – a nice slice of quiche for R25 (not too bad), a fiery alcoholic gingerbeer for R20, and a delectable raspberry and chocolate cupcake from “take the cake”. for a less than delectable price of R20.
My partner, however, was not so lucky with his food. He had a mediocre meal of what he described as “chicken bones covered in skin” and “an abomination of fruit and chicken” – not so great, but I feel that may be personal taste more than anything else.
The ambience and location were lovely, the stall holders were very friendly and obliging with my longwinded explanations and my flurry of photography (especially at Oded’s Kitchen), and the food, for the most part, was nice.
I feel that it has almost, but not quite, escaped the trap that many Cape Town markets fall into – high prices, mediocre food and music that is way too loud for the space. So I say good on you to the City Bowl market for the prime location and breezy ambience, but perhaps a bit of work on food quality and music would not go amiss.
There are some very restrictive 
mediagourmand 
