Jean-Pierre Rossouw MOVEABLE FEAST
SOME cities are weatherless. You can safely guess that the sun will set on a clear sky and rise again on the same spotless horizon.
Not so in Cape Town. Here seasons have their own personalities, each of them distinct. So when a restaurant sets out a menu that tries to reflect the weather, it must be a place with a sense of environment. Cafe Paradiso sits in a beautiful old Cape house up the rise of Kloof Street, which has to be one of the most interesting streets in the city for its unique village feel. Restaurants are dotted between bars, antique and craft furniture shops, health food stores, and old family shoe-repair businesses and groceries. Here you can buy a pipe, a pocket-knife, a paw-paw or a packet of koeksisters — all in a tiny
Cafe Paradiso caters for a variety of customers, from those who want coffee and cake to others who want to explore the menu a little further. The menu changes according to the season, and it is this spontaneous approach that gives the cafe much of its liveliness and vibrancy, as does the joyous style of the decor, and the way the rooms spill into the garden on a summer’s day. Resisting definition, Paradiso is a wine bar, a bakery, a deli and a breakfast eatery — generally a place to hang out and live with food and wine.
On my last visit, the autumn menu was moving to the more substantial, warming meals, while you could still get the popular hydroponically-grown salads. The soup changes daily, as does the lamb dish, which was on-the- bone Greek style on this visit. You can always get linefish, grilled to succulent perfection. There is a small, interesting selection of pastas, like mushroom ravioli and salmon panzerotti. The dishes are marked by direct tastes with combinations that splash colour on your plate.
Like the carpaccio sprinkled with parmesan as a starter, full of taste and offset by fresh herbs; the spicy chicken livers were a wholesome little hotpot and a good country helping, though the feeling was they could have been even spicier. The mains we tried were malfatti — spinach and ricotta dumplings in a bechamel sauce — delicious and light, with a delicate texture. The Greek salad on the side was a decent offering, not the misleading ”side salad” that so many slices of tomato go by. The penne alfredo was given added pizzazz by the addition of leek, to create a tasty, rich pasta. But we couldn’t finish it, let alone turn our attention to the selection of desserts …
In its desserts, Paradiso shows some more characteristic versatility. Besides those on the menu, like the ubiquitous cheesecake and apple tart, you can get up and choose from a range that were made fresh for the day.
So if you’re still designing that perfect living area- cum-kitchen that’ll remind you of that Mediterranean life of indulgence that Peter Mayle has embedded in your fertile mind, check out Cafe Paradiso for a few hours. And visit at different times, different days, different seasons — unless you’re bored with life, you shouldn’t get bored here.
Cafe Paradiso: 110 Kloof Street, Gardens, Cape Town. Ph: (021) 23-8653