RUFFLED FEATHERS

While our politicians fritter away public funds on fried chicken, some South Africans swear by the supposedly finer tastes of foreign fare

Iam sorry. I apologise. I take it all back. You will remember that back in 2013 I roasted Northern Cape premier Sylvia Lucas after she used her government credit card to spend more than R50,000 on fast food during her first 10 weeks in office. That’s a lot of fast food. mean a lot!

Lucas used her credit card to buy food at outlets such as Spur, Mike’s Kitchen, KFC, Wimpy and Ocean Basket, the Sunday Times reported.

But her spokesperson said Lucas’s spending was “not excessive” and was “totally blown out of proportion”.

Lucas must have looked extremely uncomfortable at the Nelson Mandela lecture last week. Delivering the lecture, former US president Barack Obama asked just how much money is enough. “There’s only so much you can eat … It shows a poverty of ambition just to take more and more and more.”

Where was I? Oh yes, I apologise for roasting Lucas. It turns out her R50,000 expenditure was small fry if you consider the behaviour of other “leaders” in SA.

Last week it was reported that the municipal manager of the cash-strapped Enoch Mgijima municipality in the town of Komani‚ formerly Queenstown, spent a whopping R90‚000 on fried chicken after his appointment.

Investigative TV show Carte Blanche said the municipality is so broke it’s resorted to selling off assets such as fire engines and road graders. Yet records show municipal manager Chris Magwangqana spent R90‚000 on “catering” — listed as KFC. Asked about this, he said: “If you compare that to what we spend each month on cleaning the town and township‚ that R90‚000 is far less than what we spend.”

We are in trouble. A big fat load of trouble.

All this made me feel peckish. So off I went for something to eat. A few good I people have told me, after noticing my predilection for French bistros, to try the nearly 130-year-old French patisserie brand Paul at Melrose Arch.

I don’t really have a sweet tooth or like a lot of baked stuff, but the restaurant has an extensive and eclectic menu of bistro-style dishes plus some pastas and burgers, among other dishes on the full menu.

It really is a carboholic’s heaven in there: from the amply stocked counter you can get sandwiches, croissants, quiches and pastries. Tim Noakes would have a fit, but the patrons — who all looked very thin, funnily enough — didn’t seem to care. They were having fun.

I enjoyed Paul, though I did not think it was as fabulous as some people make it out to be. I find it interesting that we revere foreign restaurant chains in SA, and that’s what has happened with Paul. People swear by it because they have seen it elsewhere in the world.

The only downer was that this restaurant, renowned for good service elsewhere, did not do that well on the day of my visit. Our waiter hardly appeared without being called, despite us sitting right next to the waiting staff’s station. I saw other diners waving desperately for others, too.

There were three of us. One had a cappuccino, which she said was excellent. I’ve been fighting a dastardly bug for the past three weeks, so I needed something substantial. I liked the look of the sole meunière. When sole is perfect, it’s heaven. This one was just that, too.

Maybe I should go back. Okay, I will. This is 100 times better than our politicians’ fast food — and their lies.

We revere foreign restaurant chains, like Paul, in SA … People swear by it because they have seen it elsewhere in the world

Paul Bakery ★★★½

Corner of High Street and Crescent Drive Melrose Arch, Johannesburg Tel: 010-020-3002

★★★★★ Phakamani Hadebe! ★★★★ Excellent ★★★ Good ★★ Poor ★ Sylvia Lucas