Food and wine pairing at The Woodlands Eatery

 20 February 2024

 

THE WOODLANDS EATERY

4 Breda Street, Oranjezicht, Cape Town

 

As the wife and I drunkenly ambled back to our house at about 23h00, while she repeatedly requested me to tone down my noise levels; I felt that this particular struggle was real, I recalled the conversation we had about a week before.

 

The Woodlands Eatery is hosting a food and wine pairing dinner, partnering with Doolhof Estate, the wife said, shall we go?  We can invite some friends to join us and make a fun night of it.

 

You know I don’t drink wine, I retorted.

 

You will drink the wine, the wife said, all of it, and you’ll like it.

 

Oh, okay.

 

The deal was four courses, each paired with wine, and a dolce for R455,00 a head. Bargain, as we calculated that the vino would continua with almost no limitation, given that it was a promotion by the wine estate.

The wife booked and I paid the required R500,00 deposit, as  our party would number five.

 

Our table was next to the bar, in the front of the upstairs space, close to the speechifying, with the rest of the diners in the larger, wider space between us and the windows. The acoustics aren’t great and at times the noise of the other excited, happy patrons often threatened to drown out the general conversation at our table. The drunker one gets, the louder one’s conversation gets and if one’s already almost shouting when you’re still sober, imagine how raucous it got.

 

The wife wisely stuck to sparkling water but us other four each had an alcoholic beverage to tide us over until the main event.  

 

First course comprised Greek inspired chicken skewers with paper thin focaccia and paired with a Sauvignon Blanc.  The accompaniments were tzatziki and chopped chillies.  The chicken was succulent and flavourful but if you made the mistake of enhancing your mouthful with some chilli, your palate and lips were on fire for days afterwards. Well, a  good few minutes anyhow.

 

The wine was gentle on the palate, well rounded and with no acidity and very satisfying for the likes of a peasant like me who doesn’t drink this stuff anymore and has lost whatever discernment I once might have had. What I can say, this was the first of two wines on the night, I could see myself, if I were a wine drinker, consuming quite a bit of on an occasion like tonight.

 

The chicken was followed by the calamari and goat’s cheese sauce, paired with a Chenin Blanc.

 

The calamari was perfectly cooked and the crisp crust was light as a cloud; the cheese sauce went will with the seafood. The wine had a similar initial taste to  that of the Sauvignon  Blanc but had a slightly acidic aftertaste that made it seem less well-rounded.

 

The third course, a delicious home-made pasta, was paired with a Syrah Renache and I liked this one too, because it was less demanding than a Cabernet Sauvignon and, obviously far less harsh than Tassenberg, and sat smoothly on the palate. The wife adores a Syrah or Shiraz (the same thing, apparently) and was well  happy with this one.  I was quite content with it, too, until I necked some Malbec.

 

The aforementioned Malbec was paired with the last savoury course, quite simply bravura mouthfuls of lamb arancini, and I almost giggled with delighted delirium.  The Malbec was lighter and sweeter than the Syrah, very easy on the palate and totally got my attention. If I were to stock my wine cellar from scratch, I’d start with the Sauvignon Blanc and the Malbec.

 

Throughout, course by course, Wimpie from Doolhof Estate waxed lyrical about all the subtle flavour notes the cognoscenti and wine fundis could identify in the nose of the wine or a sip, but for me it’s just about liking it or not.  

 

Interestingly, the red wines were served cool, allegedly average European room temperature (in February, I guess), which is somewhat lower than ours.

 

We finished with scrumptious, simple chocolate truffles that oozed chocolate decadence with the minimal amount of added sugar.

I thought the sequencing of the meal was a tad odd. In my mind, the procession should’ve been arancini, calamari, pasta and chicken. I suppose one doesn’t do the pairing as white, red, white, red, and it worked out fine. We were well fed, didn’t go hungry and our glasses were certainly not half empty.

 

At the end of the meal, there was a lucky draw for a Magnum bottle of Doolhof Rosé among those who’d ordered wine from the estate, and a member of our party won the prize.

 

You can’t make this stuff up.

 

Our friends kindly pitched in to pay our share of the bill, after deduction of the deposit, so I don’t know, other than 5 x R455,00, what the bill came to.

 

Woodlands Eatery have been doing this kind of thing every couple of months for a few years now and intend continuing.  I would highly recommend it to anyone who hasn’t been. You’ll eat well, drink copious amounts of excellent wine and be a celebrating segment of a hive mind of happiness. If a non-wine drinker like me can appreciate the wine, the fundis should be on cloud nine.

 

For those of you who don’t live a few minutes’ walk away, I’d suggest a designated driver or Uber / Bolt.

 

Comparisons are odious but often instructive.  For R455,00 a head we had a similar amount of good quality food, even if more “rustic,” to the R700,00 a head fine dining sharing menu at The Bailey the other night and at Woodlands Eatery we drank our fill for free (except for the beer) whereas The Bailey provided one free glass of bubbly.  The wine pairing night was more exuberantly jolly than the quietly joyful romantic dinner, and in a very basic setting compared to the elegance of The Bailey. 

 

Aah, I suppose should accept that each occasion was special and very enjoyable in its  own way and leave it at that.