TASTE O DYSSEY

Delightful but difficult-to-find Eike will inspire all your senses, writes

T’S been 11 years since Bertus Basson opened the award-winning Overture restaurant at Hidden Valley Wines in Stellenbosch. This month, he added number six to his growing empire of eateries. I invited myself to Eike on its second night and there are a few things I’d like to share.

First of all, and because you are definitely going to want to go there, it’s not easy to find (unless they’ve since put a sign up on Dorp Street). Long story short, it’s not on the road; stand in front of Simply Asia and you’ll see a driveway to your left. Go there. Go on – it looks wrong, but it’s not.

Turn the corner around the building to your left and then diagonally left from there you’ll see the entrance, with its classy glass doors and warm welcoming light behind old-fashioned dimpled windows.

Heritage is what informs a lot of Basson’s cooking in all his restaurants, and while tradition forms the foundation for many dishes, they are all elevated with his unique creativity and vision. Waxing lyrical? Perhaps. Stick with me.

“When you visit Italy and you go to a restaurant it is a cultural expression of Italy,”

Isays Basson. “Eike expresses South African food, not just the cheesy bits, but also about what is kiff about South Africa.”

Open for dinner only Tuesdays to Saturdays, Eike serves a set menu of multiple courses (dietary requirements will be accommodated as far as possible) which will, in Basson’s words, change as inspiration strikes.

You can sit at a table, or at the wide marble kitchen counter, where you can watch the team up close as they plate and present, with murmurings of “yes, chef ” repeated like a quiet culinary benediction.

Basson will be there as often as he can, but Eike remains in the capable hands of Kyle du Plooy, who was previously the sous chef at Overture.

I’d been sitting there a few minutes when Basson leaned over and pushed the rose gold plant pot closer to me. “That’s your first course,” he said. Which part, I wanted to know? Sometimes you just can’t tell what’s edible and what’s not. “The roasted kale with dukkah,” he replied. The curtain had gone up in this theatre.

That was followed by a teeny, tiny wildebeest and celeriac “taco” bite, served on crumpled tissue

Main course: plankievleis, crisp potato, pampoen poffertjies, spinach.

Opsitkers - a candle, but you can eat it, with cured lamb jelly and kohlrabi.

Bobotie, not like ouma used to make.