Kitchen Diary

Righteo then, it has been a hectic few days since I last told you that brownieboy and I had been invited out for a wonderful fine dining experience.....my apologies for the delay in reporting back blogland....but SIL and grandson Ty had their birthday on Saturday and I had to do the baking as you lot all know!! And then to add insult to injury we had to babysit Wildman Jay on Saturday night so the boys could party in peace!! LOL!! When that little fella is around there is NO TIME for anything else :o)

Anyway......first things first.......the report back!!

A few weeks ago we were invited by Granny Hen to a dinner for friends on Thursday night. Now as you might or might not know, GH won a fabulous prize with M-Net and she and OC arrived in Cape Town on Wednesday (transported here by Mango Airlines). They were whisked from the Airport to the Table Bay Hotel at the VA by means of a luxury Merc E Class courtesy car. On arrival they were welcomed by the GM and staff and booked into their suite up on the 7th floor with a wonderful panoramic view of the VA and Cape Town......GH has been babbling on ever since about fruit baskets, spa baths, Camelot Spa treatments, food, celebrity status and (pretend) rich & (in)famous since then....I don't know so much about the pretend part.........they fitted in very well there in amongst all the elegance and extravagance......and as for infamous??? Well, she said it not me HAHA!!! But what an amazing prize. 5 nights as guests of the hotel and a host of other things included.......among other things the dinner  for up to 10 friends at the Captains Table in the Atlantic Restaurant to the value of R10,000......yep folks, that works out at R1000 per person. Who ever would've thought that you could spend that much on one person sitting around a dinner table for a couple of hours...???

It had been touch and go as to whether we would attend seeing as brownieboy had the fractured spine. But he is no slouch in the recovery department and has progressed well to date. The decision was made almost at the 11th hour to attend and so we set off excitedly on Thursday evening, in the pouring rain with brownieboy all corseted up and instructions to bring his special back friendly chair seat with us. Arrived at the Table Bay and walked into the foyer and were immediately swept up by generous hugs and welcomes from Granny Hen and OC (which incidentally stands for Old Cock if you lot don't know hehe). What absolutely fabulous people. Friendly, loving and full of fun with great sense of humour. They made us feel so at home and we proceeded to have a wonderful evening of fun and raucous laughter (against this beautiful backdrop)

interspersed with excellent service amid delicate slurping of Moet & Chandon champagne

(ooooh yeah baby!!!),

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Elsenham Artesian Water,

the one in the tall square bottles *blink blink* expensive water

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fabulous starters - over the lips, over the gums, watch out tummy here it comes HAHA!!

(Deconstructed) Prawn Cocktail with Beluga Caviar, Asparagus,

Snails - the fork says it all Mildred (that would be Belinda's older cousin) and French Onion Soup

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then we got our palates thoroughly cleansed (in preparation for the taste sensation to come)......

Yellow for the boys, pink for the girls teehee.....

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wonderful tasty main dishes from chef Dallas Orr's fine dining selection

kabeljou, rib eye steak, chateaubriand, baked veg in phyllo parcel

As you all know I am a sucker for bowls of all shape and size and these eye catching ones made me covet

You can never have enough in your arsenal as a food blogger (",)

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and then, of course because no fine dining experience would be complete without it,  the piece de resistance for any browniegirl of worth..............

fabulous dessert!!!!!!! The sugar work was stunning!!

Tart au citron with raspberry sorbet, "something" Huguenot(hehe) which was

vanilla sponge soaked in french cognac with fruit salad

homemade ice cream in brandy snap baskets, coconut & white chocolate creme brulee

fabulous cheese platter

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 and the grande finale (for us anyway) 

Klein Constantia Vin de Constance 2004 -  the re-creation of the famous Constantia wine made in the 18th and 19th centuries, favoured by Napoleon Bonaparte who, I believe, sent his ships to the Cape to fetch his supplies. It is made from raisined Muscat de Frontignan grapes, believed to be from the same clones that were originally planted in Constantia, matured in French Oak barrels and bottled in replicas of the original 500ml bottle. The total maturation time in the cellar for the 2004 vintage which we (thoroughly) enjoyed is around 4 years. When our lovely wine dude Dominic poured that deep golden natural (unfortified) sweet wine into our glasses I just knew I was in for an experience that I will most definitely not repeat in this lifetime...maybe there will be Vin de Constance & Moet in heaven...I hope so hehe. 

These were placed on the table just as we were saying our goodbyes

to the rest of the party who were settling in for some more fun over coffee & cognac/liqueurs - brownieboy's back had had enough punishment for the day. So no, I never got to see the spa bath upstairs, or the bedroom! But I did look very carefully on the facebook pics and saw no sign of a chandelier!!!!!!

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And that, in short, is a description of our once in a lifetime treat around The Captain's Table in the Atlantic Restaurant in The Table Bay Hotel. I hope this post has allowed you, dear readers, to live a little vicariously through me......just for a moment or two.

Thank you so much Granny Hen (& her OC) for inviting us to share in this fabulous prize of yours and for introducing us to vivacious & highly entertaining Ananda Russ(catch her on CCFm the 1st Wednesday of every month on Morning Rondevouz) and her lovely hubby and Meezie - one of blogland's delightful bloggers who is currently a lurker, and her equally lovely hubby. Who would've thought that someone who looks so young could be a granny??????? Hehe...hello Meezie, was lovely to meet you too :o)

Sorry, no photos of the party goers, they all need to maintain their anonymity and infamity (",)

Now this has taken me the better part of Monday to put together (Letterdash rage and the album editor is enough to drive me to drink....but hang on a minute.....I dont have any Moet in the house, just the cake brandy teehee!!) so best I move on and get other things done. I have another post to do about the birthday weekend. Oi vey! This could take forever. I didn't even get a chance to do Polkies Friday Food Quiz. Sorry girl...next time :o)

Have a great week blogland....back to home reality for Granny Hen who flies back (to where she came from) this evening :o)

browniegirl xxx