Veritably vegan at SUSA restaurant

 10 May 2024

 

SUSA Restaurant

70 – 72 Bree Street, Cape Town

 

This is possibly the fourth time I’ve eaten breakfast at these premises and each time it’s been a different eatery. The only continuity is the art gallery setting. 

 

The look and style of the various restaurant’s has improved from pretty basic to the quite luxuriously elegant current iteration with dark wood tables, dark upholstered bucket chairs, oriental carpets and a lounge area at the rear and, as always, intriguing modern art on the walls.  In short, it’s quite lovely and, even if the space is large, somehow cosy even on a cold, wet morning like today.

 

As has been my experience at all of the premises occupants, I was the only patron for breakfast.

 

The breakfast options, as you can see from the menu, cover just some standard, popular options but I guess the general patron will find something to eat unless the truncated Cape Town version of the “full English” is their yen.

I ordered the vegan breakfast (R80), an option that always makes the wife shudder at the horror, the horror but though I don’t adhere to a vegan diet (I refuse to be restricted in my life choices) I am quite fond of vegan dishes provided there are no fake versions of non-vegan items.   

This dish was superb even if it seems that serving an aubergine steak rare (the way I like my steak) isn’t a thing. The aubergine was surprisingly challenging to cut with a table knife yet then melted in the mouth. The proportions of the various elements were generous; big  shoutout to the  delightfully crisp potatoes. 

 

For sweet afters, my choices were limited to a brownie, malva pudding or baklava (R95), and I chose the latter, without ice-cream, to accompany my cappuccino.   Baklava is not my favourite thing but this was good and not as cloyingly sweet as I always fear it might be. The coffee was excellent.

The bill (with espresso and cappuccino) came to R230,00.

 

I don’t mind eating breakfast in splendid isolation, listening, in this instance, to very entertaining modern pop and rock, but it always puzzles me why an establishment opens for breakfast if it attracts no customers. Some people wandered in to have coffee and there was a group of younger people who came to look at the art but otherwise the kitchen wasn’t overstretched by demand.

 

While it lasts, though, I’d highly recommend SUSA for breakfast, as the food seems to be excellent, if the vegan dish is anything to go by, and the prices are incredibly reasonable for a luxurious restaurant like this in Cape Town.  The interesting art adds that extra wow factor.