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Doppio Zero in town and News Cafe at Artscape (31-Dec-08)

DOPPIO ZERO (00) is the grade of Italian flour used for pizza and pasta. It is also a fitting name for a restaurant chain that offers a Mediterranean menu with baked items at its core.

The recently opened branch in Mandela Rhodes Place in Cape Town was popular the night we dined and one of the things that impressed me most was the family portion on the menu.

Speaking of family, I’ve recently revisited the Godfather Trilogy movies and have had Spaghetti with Meat Balls on the mind. At Doppio Zero they serve it in a light tomato sauce with the meaty balls herby and delicious.

I started with a half-‘n-half pizza: butternut with caramelized onions and creamy gorgonzola, pine nuts and honey. Delicious. They call it Gne Gne Gne which I could not fathom how to pronounce, (even after a year’s Italian classes.) I’m relieved that it isn’t Italian at all but rather that sing-song taunt when one another has something you want.

Ask your waiter to sing it to you (you’ll find their name on the table.) The other half was the Bellisimo with artichokes, halomi, tomato and rocket.

Some of the pizza names are wonderfully amusing: Costa Plenty with rosemary roast lamb, feta and tsatsiki. Prada with mushrooms, red peppers, roasted brinjals and feta. I like that they don’t take themselves seriously – on the menu it says Mad in Italy rather than Made in Italy.
The minestrone soup for one is almost sufficient for three to share as a starter. For bookings contact 021 424 9225 or visit www.doppio.co.za.

In London’s West End there are restaurants where autograph seekers know they will find their stage heroes before and after performances. Now Cape Town has one too. Although not new, The News Café at Artscape is notable for its clientele, many from the theatre world and others from the City whose offices are across the way. This combination gives it a special buzz over lunch and after work.
This is not a place to come for cuisine but, if you’re after snacky things with drinks I can recommend the rocket and rump ciabatta.

Expect rump steak sliced with rocket and grilled tomato. Also good is the chicken and jalapeno ciabatta for a little zing - grilled chicken breast, avocado and topped with grilled feta and mozzarella cheese topped with jalapeno mayonnaise.
Their signature drink, listed under Anger Management on the cocktail menu, is the Pangalactic Gargle Blaster. It looks like something off the set of the Rocky Horror Show and it tastes like just the thing to take more than the edge off. Not surprising really when you consider it includes vodka, orange juice layered on top of cherry liqueur, grenadine and peach schnapps before being topped with blue curacao, lemon and lime.

Although I ordered the chicken bites with Nachos combo I was just served the bites - crumbed chicken strips served with chips and bbq dip.
Willie Stegmann is the manager there and I found him really accommodating. My lunch companion is a theatre regular who complained about food taking too long before shows. Willie explained they now have a paired-down pre-theatre dinner menu and, if patrons like my fussy friend call in advance, they can pre-order from the car. A very nice, personal touch for a franchised operation.
021 410 9852 www.newscafe.co.za


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Casper Oelofsen on Bizerca (12-Nov-08)

Review of Bizerca by Casper Oelofsen

I was fortunate. I bailed out of a group gathering at Ocean Basket and decided to make a late unbooked entry at Bizerca on a Tuesday eve

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Azure summer menu and Dornier's new chef (31-Oct-08)

ESTATE agents will sing-song position, position, position which is never truer when one’s outlook is onto the sea or arrestingly beautiful mountains. Azure Restaurant at the 12 Apostle’s has such a view over the Atlantic that it is hard to remember that one is in a hotel just 20-minutes from Cape Town and not on an ocean liner on the deep blue. Like its name suggests, Azure is blue. Not in sad way like people who mope but like those who sing bada bi, bada bum at the views and long-time chef’s Roberto De Carvahlo’s cuisine.
There are twelve new items on the menu which we previewed as a three-course plated meal with four samplings per plate. Starter stand-outs included the Crayfish Bisque, rich and flavourful with wild fennel, diced crayfish, white wine and brandy enriched by double cream and served with prawn and sesame ginger toasts. The gravlax of Scandinavian salmon was good and attractively served with poached quail’s egg.
Although I really enjoyed the Cape Malay chicken curry very much, the fish of the day made the biggest impression on me with its perfectly cooked chunky prawn, tomato and smoked Spanish paprika sauce. The accompanying spinach and ricotta Panzarotti crescent is like eating a silk pocket of flavour. Azure is one of the few restaurants (too few to my mind) that make cooking with fynbos a focus. The Buchu Crème Brûlée is example of how to create a perfectly delicious and uniquely Cape dish.
Azure at 12 Apostles Hotel. 021-437-9000.

The view of the mountains from Dornier wine estate on the Blaauwklippen, Stellenbosch road is achingly beautiful and I’m pleased to say the food matches perfectly.
I have always enjoyed what I’ve eaten at

Dornier’s Bodega restaurant but after feasting with new chef Naas Pienaar (whom I stupidly called Morne throughout the meal) the restaurant could be in line for culinary awards.
His emphasis is on sourcing farm-fresh ingredients and treating them respectfully with slow cooking that plays pied-piper with flavours drawing them out from the flesh’s deepest recesses.
The lamb shoulder, for example is cooked for many hours in a wood-fed oven that it offers up its own scents on a garlic magic carpet. The accompanying carrots and potatoes look and taste beautiful, still glistening from being cooked in duck fat. Madagascan pepper steak is a winner while catch of the day is dressed with vanilla and lime butter reduction.
Chef Naas, it seems, has affairs with ingredients. When we dined he’d added fresh porcini to many dishes. Unlike some restaurants where they work the same few ingredients into as many dishes as possible, here, buoyed by his culinary abundance, it reads as generous rather than money saving.
He has an impressive CV with Londolozi and three of Cape Town’s five star hotel kitchen’s listed. The proof as always is in the eating and at Bodega you can do so with pleasure and confidence.
Be sure to book first. I noticed at least five groups being turned away who arrived without reservations.
Bodega at Dornier. 021-880-0557
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