Pat Schwartz
food
They do everything better in Cape Town. We know this because Capetonians keep telling us they do. So when I set off to compare the buffet lunches at Cape Town’s Melissa’s and Johannesburg’s The Service Station, I expected to return home humbled and destined to be perpetually dissatisfied. Not at all!
Melissa’s is a legend among foodies in the Mother City and deservedly so. To call it a deli is to insult it. It’s a gourmet’s (and gourmand’s) paradise, wall-to-wall fresh, uniquely packaged and frozen wonders that beg to be taken home. As a restaurant, however, it could do better.
The Service Station, at the north-west gateway to Melville on Rustenburg Road, is a restaurant with an incidental deli. Melissa’s is a deli with an incidental restaurant. In fact, it is three delis with three restaurants the original in Kloof Street, a mini clone in Newlands and the newest version in Constantia.
We opted for the original. Arriving early (knowing it is almost impossible to get a table after 12.30pm), we sat and waited for the buffet to appear. We were studiously ignored by the staff, none of whom evidently thought it worthwhile to offer us a drink.
The appointed hour brought an array of fine-looking dishes salads, three quiches and two pastas from which to make up our pay-by-the-kilo (R70) meal. The quiches that day were bacon, grilled vegetable, and broccoli and feta. The pastas were tuna and roast vegetables; the salads included a caprese with brinjals and several forms of mixed greens.
Lovely … except that only the tuna pasta, which was overwhelmed with tomato and chilli, had a flavour which distinguished it from the others, and the salads, apart from the unusual, though bland, caprese, were forgettable. Co-luncher found his bacon quiche no more interesting than the other two, which I sampled. And the quiches were cold.
From the range of sinfully tempting desserts, which included three different death-by-chocolate confections, I settled on a grana-dilla tart that was light, creamy, satisfyingly granadillary and definitely the best part of the meal. The coffee was too bitter even for this espresso addict and they have no licence, so a glass of wine with lunch is not an option. The Service Station charges R5/kg more for its buffet lunch but provides staff who welcome lunchers, offer drinks (including good wines, served either by the glass or the bottle), and give a run-down on ingredients for the benefit of picky eaters.
Co-luncher and I laid into the artichoke and tomato, courgettes and red peppers, and sweet potatoes, spinach and sunflower seed quiches, each offering an entirely different texture and taste treat. All of them, and the pasta, with its luxuriously creamy mushroom sauce, were kept warm on a hot tray. Salads that day included boiled baby potatoes in their jackets, couscous, a bowl of greens full of delicious surprises, and a caprese dressed with pesto and fresh basil.
Desserts are chosen at the counter. My personal favourite is a totally seductive almond tart but one day I will break out and dive into the chocolate or cheesecake. My ice cream-loving friend goes into ecstasies over flavours like ginger and cinnamon. And the espresso is good.
Perhaps the attitude of the serving staff at Melissa’s (and the success of the concept) mirrors the attitudes of those in the kitchen people are going to queue up anyway; why bother to give that attention to detail which distinguishes okay food from really good food. The Service Station, despite the fact that to get lunch at all you have to fight off the hordes of media and arts glitterati who frequent it, has retained a more personal touch that is reflected in the quality of the meals served.
The Service Station (011) 726-1701. Melissa’s, Kloof Street (021) 424-5540