Dine with the Italians at The Woodlands Eatery

 25 June 2024

 

“DINE WITH THE ITALIANS” #2 

at

THE WOODLANDS EATERY 

Breda Street, Oranjezicht, Cape Town

 

You may remember that we did this back in February.  Four courses paired with four wines for R455,00 a head.

 

Well, we did it again once our livers had a fair chance of recovering from the last blow out and were indulged in some rest and recuperation.

 

This time our companions were the estimable Tayfun Aras and his lovely wife Louise.

 

Tonight, Ricket Bridge provided the four wines and the vino flowed as generously as it did four months ago. The wife and I again stumbled home happy and carefree and ever so slightly tipsy. Our friends Ubered home.

 

We stepped into the almost fully occupied upstairs space just after 18h30 (I believe our joyous throng numbered 44 guests) and the noise was quite deafening, even more so than the clubby background music we’d experienced at Burger & Lobster the previous evening. One’s conversational style is basically just screaming back and forth across the table and it’s not only awkward but also rough on the vocal nodes. There was relative quiet only when Matteo talked about the food and the guy from Rickety Bridge enlightened us about the wines.

 

We tasted a rosé, a white blend, a Cab Sauv and a Shiraz.  As a non-wine drinker with no palate, the white blend and the Cab Sauv were the only wines I appreciated and would think of drinking again. The rest of the table enjoyed all the wines and placed orders for some of them.

Once again the four dishes did the menu descriptions more than justice.

 

The focaccia was paper thin, crisp and tasty, the mussels were exquisite, the risotto was unctuous and the beef fillet was succulent, tender and cooked to my request of “as rare as possible”.

 

Kudos to Matteo for accommodating our guests who respectively don’t eat pork or meat. The wife, who’d made the booking, gave advance warning and our friends were served their own personalised dishes.  Their risottos were vegetarian and Louis Aras was served melanzane instead of steak.

 

The dessert was chocolate truffles again.

 

The conversational challenge excepted, it’s a fun evening, with plenty wine and excellent food; an absolute must for anyone who loves good food and wine!