Impromptu Sunday lunch at Deer Park Café

 2 June 2024

 

DEER PARK CAFÉ

2 Deer Park Drive, Highlands Estate, Vredehoek, Cape Town

 

Out of bed after midday, showered and dressed at turbo speed, drove up to the very dog friendly Deer Park Café with the Yorkies, got a good parking spot close to the restaurant and a vacant table at the front of the building, far away from most other patrons so that, hopefully, Prinses would be less angst about strangers in her vicinity and Lucy wouldn’t go begging at neighbouring tables.

 

Sometimes, spontaneity works out well.

 

We drank coffee and tequila sunrise cocktails. The latter was the first cocktail I ever drank, in my callow, unsophisticated youth, primarily because of the Eagles song of the same name, but is hardly seen on cocktail menus nowadays.  Beautiful colour, sweet and alcoholic. Got a light buzz.

 

The wife ordered the chicken burger (R159) and was very happy indeed with the tender succulent and tasty chicken breast with melted camembert and caramelised onions’ it was a winner of a dish, one the best of its ilk the wife’s eaten.

I chose the aloo matter (potato and pea) curry with paratha (R125) and was equally happy with the dish, though the wife pointed out that it was a tapas portion rather than a filling meal, but that was okay with me. The potatoes were firm yet cooked through, the peas plentiful, the paratha soft and flaky and the curry flavour deep and satisfactory.

Our appreciation of the desserts was qualified. Mine was the apple crumble (R58) and the wife chose the chocolate cake (R62).

My father in law makes a superlative apple and pear crumble and though the fruit is yummy but on par with the Deer Park tart, his crumble is like feather, light short short-crust pastry when baked where the Deer Park crumble is a tad overbaked and hard, not so much crumble as crunch, what one generally finds in commercial crumbles.

 

The wife thought that the crumb of the cake crumb was too dense though the chocolatey richness was luxurious. For me, the still slightly moist crumb was perfect and I quickly finished off what she left on her plate.

 

The bill came to R713,00.

 

We’ve eaten at Deer Park Café a few times over the last couple of years and have been impressed each time. The blackboard menu changes regularly, the food is always excellent, the service is friendly and efficient, the vibe is upbeat and the coffee is good. Specifically on weekends, there are lots of dogs and lots of kids though, for the most part, only the latter are excitable and noisy.