Last week I had the BEST time at the Zomato blogger’s meet up in Cape Town. This time it was held at the Milner Hotel’s Glass Lounge. I used to live in Hillside road, within a block of the Milner Hotel, but had never visited before. I understand the Glass Lounge was newly renovated though and it’s spectacular! I literally can’t wait to go back there!
This was my second Zomato meetup and I can’t begin to tell you how much fun it was! Zomato is a super cool brand that’s global, but was recently launched in South Africa. This time they invited us to the hotel for a tasting menu. I brought along my two good friends, Side Show and Phill Black who are already hilarious. Luckily it turned out the other guests were also awesome and we had so many laughs!
We were really spoilt when it came to the food and wine. Freshly bakes salt and herb bread was delivered to the table accompanies by a wonderful white wine. For our amouse bouche, we had
This was followed by a starter of Truffle and Cheese Croquettes, Ostrich Carpaccio and Tom Yum Soup. Of course me being half Irish, anything potato makes me happy, but the croquettes were so delicate and delicious. The Ostrich carpaccio was also absolutely gorgeous. It was a type of reconstructed Waldorf salad with apple, celery and walnuts – I thought it was accompanied by pineapple! It perfectly off set the ostrich and I liked that it was rolled into little towers. Eating flatted carpaccio can always be a bit silly as it takes up an entire plate almost for nothing. The Tom Yum Soup was also delicious. It offered a little kick in the back of the throat while the front of the mount enjoyed the warm umami taste from the variety of mushrooms. Divine!
After starters, we carried on having some good old fashioned banter and learning about each other’s experiences as bloggers and the industry in general. It was a great occasion to meet Sarah-Jane from Sarahndipity – someone who I’d followed in Twitter for quite some time. We got on like a house on fire and it was awesome to meet another blogger without a ginormous ego (you know bloggers can really be full of SH!T sometimes).
The wine was also delicious 😉 But seriously, the staff were very friendly, kept up topped up on both wine AND water and were very attentive.
Our mains then arrived which was another smorgasbord of treats. This included a butternut ravioli, rooibos smoked venison loin (amazing!) and salmon en papillote (a technique where the fish is cooked in a paper bag). They were all spectacular! (And I don’t even like sea food!) The mains were really lovely. Beautifully cooked asparagus with a hollandaise sauce. Soft, smooth potato mash with sugar snap peas and the butternut raviolli with sage and percorino was wonderful.
After this feast, desserts then arrived. My goodness! I’m not a big dessert person so I never expect much, but I really enjoyed the Glass Lounge’s dessert platter. The coconut panacotta was sprinkled with grape pop rocks that really worked with the cooked cream. Then again, I am a sucker for a good panacotta. Next was a lovely chocolate tart with caramelised oranges. It also had a caramalised sauce which the chef had taken RIGHT to the edge while cooking so it had a deep, wonderfully rich flavour. I enjoyed the sweet taste of orange that cut through the dish, but I know some of the others aren’t big orange and chocolate fans. Finally a passion fruit creme brulee with a fine, fine glass like toffee shard. I always expect it to be eggy or split but it was perfect.
It was the first bloggers dinner I had ever attended where I literally liked everything they gave us – including sea food (which I don’t eat). I only had a bite of the prawn and the salmon but they were both lovely (as lovely as it can be for a non-seafood eater!). Afterwards we joined the smokers outside to see the colour changing pool (rainbow colours!) and have a few more laughs.
To wrap up the WHOLE evening (as if we’d not had enough to eat), we were given a little box of macaroons for the road. WOW.
I’d like to give Zomato and The Cape Milner Hotel a HUGE thank you for the wonderful evening for fine wine, food, banter and laughter. I think it’s the best blogger’s dinner/meet up I’ve ever had! Thank you so much for having me.
