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New Year

My oupie always said that what you do in the beginning of the year is what you’ll be doing for the rest of the year, so I decided to spend it  sleeping in, watching Julia Child and making cupcakes. I think it’ll be a good year, right? In the spirit of Cape Town’s Tweede Nuwe Jaar, I’ve decided that today counts as the new year too, so that means blogging counts as what I’ll be doing for the rest of the year too. I found these lucky new year’s recipes which are just beautiful, and I’m thinking of making Momofuko’s ginger scallion noodles for a late lunch. This is going to be a good (and delicious) year, I’m sure of it.

Momofuko ginger scallion noodles. Image: Gabriele Stabile

More than just wine

Recently, wine farms in Cape Town have become more than just farms – they have become destinations in themselves. It began with small restaurants attached to cellars, designed to feed visitors and wine tasters simple, good food. After that, the food got more complex and the restaurants came into their own, becoming the star attraction. Some examples are the Fyndraai restaurant at Solms Delta, and the Green House at Babylonstoren wine farm , but there are many, many more farms and cellars which boast the “destination” status. Now, wine farms are diversifying still more, offering everything from cheese to chocolate.

As part of my exploration of this delicious phenomenon, I explored Fairview, as well as the neighbouring farm,  the Spice Route.

Fairview is a beautiful farm in Paarl, near the ‘Taal Monument’ (also known as the most bizarre construction in the Western Cape, if you ask me). The farm itself is very old, and has been used to cultivate grapes for wine since 1699. Fairview was bought by winemaker Charles Back in 1937, and the family have farmed there ever since.

The farm was first known for its award winning wines, but since the introduction of a cheesery in 1980, it has been increasingly known for its wonderful goat’s cheese and iconic goat tower.

The famous “Goat Tower” inspired by similar towers seen in Portugal by the Backs

One can now go for a cheese tasting as well as a wine tasting, and children can have fun feeding and milking goats for the nominal price of R10 (though the children I saw were somewhat suspicious of what was coming out of the goat they were milking, not quite as impressed as I would have thought!).

Traditional preserves

Next door to Fairview is the stunningly beautiful farm known as the Spice Route. It is also owned by the Back family, but is much, much more than just a wine farm, although the wines on offer are particularly good.

The farm has now become home to all manner of skilled craftsmen and women – “The vision for Spice Route is to offer local and international tourists a group of hand-picked artisanal producers, who puts as much thought, skill and passion into their products, as the Spice Route Winemaker, Charl du Plessis, does when crafting his wines,” says Spice Route Wines owner, Charles Back.

One of the many beautiful buildings at Spice Route

I had the pleasure of visiting most of the artisans who call the Spice Route home:

DV Chocolate specialises in bean to bar production of fine quality single origin chocolate. They offer a chocolate tasting for R20 during which customers are guided through a tasting of various chocolates much like one would be guided through a wine tasting. The employees are incredibly knowledgeable and will answer even the most complex of questions with skill (I was with two serious chocolate connoisseurs who really know their stuff, and they were very impressed).

The delicious Amber Weiss

After our chocolate tasting, we took a stroll to the Cape Brewing Company where we had a beer tasting for R25, which I think is a steal. I’m not much of a beer drinker (I’m a cider girl at heart, with James Mitchell’s Real Cider being my favourite) but their Amber Weissbier wooed me and I think I may be in love!

Next we visited the Red Hot Glass hand blown glass studio. The work was intricate and (mostly) tasteful, but I felt a bit like a bull in a china shop, so we didn’t stay too long!

And that was the end of a beautiful day. I would have loved to have visited more farms, but these two offered so much that exploring them took all day.  Though I still appreciate wine farms which offer only wine tasting, I love the idea of making each farm a destination in itself. I will definitely need to go back to explore more of the Paarl wine-scene. I still need to go to the Wilderer’s Distillery & La Grapparia Restaurant, as well as the Spice Route restaurant and cellar – more than one day is necessary!