FROM EARTH

Farmer, chef, artist, builder, visionary... award winning Chef Adriaan Maree of Fermier Restaurant spoke to Mart-Marie du Toit about his journey and unique sustainable restaurant

Karoo Yard, 141 Lynnwood Road, The Willows, Pretoria www.fermierrestaurant.com.

Fermier is one of the busiest fine-dining restaurants around, with a waiting list of weeks to get a table. A finalist in the recent Eat Out Awards (and only restaurant in Pretoria to crack the nod), the ingredients on the plates leaving the open kitchen are not only tasty works of art, but produce that chef Maree has farmed himself. Adriaan’s culinary journey started at the Prue Leith Chefs Academy in Centurion and continued in the Western Cape at Grande Provence. He then had a stint in the UK where he worked at Wild Honey and the Michelin-starred Hibiscus in London.

“I learnt more at Hibiscus in six months than any other place. It was tough, and very hard work, and I would have stayed longer if my visa allowed,” he says.

He returned to South Africa after two years and joined the team at Rust en Vrede.

“It was a dream team guided by David Higgs and the two years there was amazing.”

He was appointed head chef at Roots at Forum Homini. His CV mentions chefs Peter Templehoff, David Higgs, John Shuttleworth and Claude Bosi as influences.

“In starting Fermier Restaurant we had zero planning. Architect John du Raan, owner of the Karoo Yard property, a farm area in Pretoria, came to me in November 2014 with an idea about a greenhouse — and a restaurant in a greenhouse,” said Maree.

They decided against the greenhouse restaurant to protect the sensitive ecosystem. John drew lines in the sand next to the greenhouse to show the how and where of the proposed Fermier.

“It was all about functionality — like the fireplace. It is great in winter and it looks amazing in the restaurant, but it was originally installed as boilers to keep the water for the fish warm. So we installed windows on the side of the fireplaces and it now serves a double purpose,” he says.

Fermier was built out of the soil repurposed for the fish dams, with rammed earth walls and recycled wood cladding by Adriaan and a small team at Karoo Yard. Adriaan confesses he has never taken on a building project before. “But it was a welcome break from standing in the kitchen day in and day out,” he says.

The restaurant buys into selfsustainability, with not only the building but also the menu and suppliers adopting the “waste-not want-not” principle.

The restaurant won the 2017 Eat Out Style Award. The tables and chairs by Dawie Heyns and crockery by Elza van Dijk were crafted on the Karoo Yard property and the space is stylish and natural. This allows the artfully presented food to take centre stage.

The food is served from an open kitchen. The nine-course tasting menu strives to showcase produce Adriaan and his team can grow, farm or source sustainably. Even kitchen waste is used in their sustainable eco-system.

The menu changes as produce dictates and you will find not only the popular cuts of meat listed, but other options that embody the nose-to-tail concept. Fermier’s holistic approach leaves diners at once puzzled and riveted by the creativity and flavour combinations on the plates. At first glance the menu seems simple but the intricacies of flavour and depth will surprise. The portions feel small but after nine courses you realise how perfectly it all came together.

“We look at what we can get, what is fresh, seasonal ... What we can get from the small producers, what we can grow and we put together a menu based on that,” says Adriaan. “The ingredients are the stars. If you have the right ingredients you don’t have to do too much to make it shine. We always look at what we can do with an ingredient.

“What we grow is a lot more than we thought we could and a lot less than what we want to have,” he says. “We tried to farm pigs here — and that works well because nothing goes to waste — but it became too much of a problem,” he says.

Fermier serves a nine-course tasting menu for R550 per person with an optional wine pairing at R350 per person.