Dax’s Diary 

Public holidays are a killer. Don’t get me wrong, I love a day off or a long weekend as much as the next guy. April is my favourite month because of all the holidays but if you actually have to get work done, it’s a nightmare. I took off Monday the 30th and enjoyed the 5 day weekend immensely, but boy have I paid for it. The remaining 3 days of the week were hectic and involved heaps of overtime and that carried on right till the end of the following week too. I’m not sure it was worth it. Anyway, that’s behind me and now I finally have a few minutes to produce this newsletter for you.

One thing all the public holidays did allow me to do was have lots of lunches which I normally don’t get to do. So for a change you have a good number of lunch venue reviews as opposed to dinner venue reviews. I had lunch at the River Cafe a couple of times, which was very nice. Another great wine farm dining experience was at Tokara, and I also finally tested The Food Barn to see what the ex-La Colombe chef is up to.

The evenings were not spent at home: I tried out Il Leone and wasn’t blown away. Returned to an old favourite, Buena Vista, and found a new dish I like. Unfortunately I ended up having dinner at Bayside Cafe in Camps Bay one night, which was not great at all.

The highlight of the last month was definitely the Cheese Festival, a great day once again.

On the website this month we have some interesting posts and comments. I posted a request for info about options for cooking courses in Cape Town. There were quite a few responses but if you know of any others please add a comment. Roy from Wakame posted an interesting comment on how the fire started at Wakame and when they are planning to open again. I also posted an article I quite like called Where is James Bond? 

But the big news on the site this month you should have noticed already, Relax with Dax has new banners. My good friend Royden Turner put his great creative mind to the task and showered me with an inbox full of new banners so that I can have rotating banners on the site. I have put up one for now but soon a random banner will be displayed for your visual delight each time you visit the site.

Have a great month in my beautiful city.
Dax Villanueva

Restaurants, Bars & Clubs

Quite a few new clubs for a change, but not a lot happening with the restaurants… 

Someone reminded me the other day that the Blue Danube has closed. I don’t think I passed that information onto you. 

The restaurant at 30 Napier Street, called 30, in the age old tradition of naming restaurants after the street number has closed down and has been replaced with Saul’s Gourmet Grill. I assume that the word ‘gourmet’ is meant to reassure us that they won’t be serving any of the food you would find at Saul’s Saloon, which is basically the antithesis of gourmet.

Just down the road at number 32 is a new place called Elmarie’s Wine. It’s a tapas style restaurant (brunch, lunch & after work) with wines for tasting, drinking and buying. Elmarie is trying to promote wines from smaller estates and everything is sold at retail, so no heavy restaurant mark-ups. Sounds great to me. Read more about it here.

I did a review of Winesense in Kalk Bay recently, another one has opened in Mandela Rhodes Square. Like the one in Kalk Bay, it is a restaurant as well. If the food is the same as the other one then it’s pretty good.

Sinnful has some competition as a new ice-cream place has opened in Greenpoint next to the Hussar Grill. It’s called something like Lecca il Gelati and the one or two people that have mentioned it, tell me it it’s a winner.

A new club has opened in Stegman Road, Claremont (ex Town/Late Edition), called Wadda. It’s aimed at students which should make it competition for Tiger Tiger.

70 Loop Street (next door to Bang Bang) now houses a small club called House of Fun. I popped in one night on the way to Bang Bang and it’s got a great vibe going. It’s a lot cheaper as there is no cover charge. A few people have said it’s definitely a house of fun.

Kalahari Klik has opened at 27 Somerset Road, Greenpoint. Don’t know anyone who has been yet, but if you can believe the website it sounds cool.

Events

18th : Coda is performing at Relish. I went to their concert there 2 weeks ago and it was great to see them in action again, it has been a while. The performance starts at 6:30pm and is free of charge.

24th – 27th: Good Food & Wine Show at the ICC. I went to this last year, after skipping it for a couple of years because I didn’t think it was worth my time. I was quite impressed, it’s certainly come a long way and now I think it’s a worthwhile thing to do. Tickets are R70 and it’s open from 10am till 9pm. Check the website for more info.

1st – 3rd June: Whacky Wine Weekend in Robertson. This will be my first visit to the WWW and I am looking forward to it. For the past few years I have had to listen to people drone on an on about how much fun they had and how it’s the best weekend of their lives and what not. So, now I am going to experience this for myself and I will report back! Check out the website to read about all the cool activities and how the whole thing works.

Madame Zingara’s Tent of Dreams is offering entertainment on Sunday evenings from this month: 
20th: Comedy Festival
27th: Springbok Nude Girls
3rd June: Watershed
10th June: Goldfish
Tickets are R120 and doors open at 5pm. You can find more info on the website

Additionally if you haven’t been to the Tent of Dreams for the dinner and show, make an effort and go. Everyone who has been says it’s well worth the R300 plus drinks. I am going soon. I wonder if they will do a Winter in July thing around the tent?

Website of the month

Most of us like to donate some portion of our earnings to assist those who are in need. The problem with most charities these days is that you don’t know where your money is going. Sometimes up to 70% of it is spent on ‘admin’ and there is always the fear that those for whom it is intended are not seeing the benefit. Well, the Melkbos Care Centre solves that problem. They do fantastic work with children, taking them to school and collecting them too. Then taking them to the after-care centre where they are given a nutritious meal (perhaps their only one for the day) and given assistance with their homework before being picked up or taken home.

A person can make a general donation to the Care Centre, but you can also sponsor a child. For a certain monthly amount, you will be allocated a child and will receive a quarterly report on his or her progress with photos etc. You can also go and visit ‘your’ child at the centre if you like. It’s so much more rewarding to see your money actually helping someone. Helping children to receive an education will give them a real chance at life and break the cycle of poverty.

If you would like to read more about this worthy charity, visit the website http://www.ubunye.org/