The Table Bay's new executive chef feels at home
WHEN Keshan Rambarun started as the executive sous chef at The Table Bay Hotel this year, he felt like it was coming home.
He hadn’t been in Cape Town for 17 years, not since he attended cooking school.
Rambarun, 35, says he’s delighted to be at The Table Bay, nestled as it is in prime position in Cape Town’s Waterfront, looking out to the Atlantic from one end and on to a working harbour at the other.
“Then there’s Table Mountain that casts a beautiful shadow over us at all times as we go about making our visitors happy with our five-star service, delicious food and a refined air of elegance,” he says.
His varied career includes a residency as executive sous chef and executive chef at AndBeyond’s flagship resorts.
He says one of the highlights of his career was cooking at the prestigious Table of Unity meal in 2001.
His love of food and cooking comes from his mother, whose table was always laid to accommodate whoever wanted a hot meal. “It was my parents hospitality and mum’s love of good food that inspired me. I wanted to be able to cook as well as her, only with a wider range of cooking styles. That is why I trained to be a chef,” he says.
Being executive sous chef at the Table Bay is particularly pleasing for Rambarun because, he says, Cape Town has some of the country’s finest fresh produce – and locally made wines.
“The Cape has a wide range of seafood to choose from, and there are also excellent foraging possibilities with the native fynbos. Mix all that with a host of cross-cultural nationalities… and you will find me interacting with people and food, my two favourite things.”
He says his best dish is a Harissa ostrich fillet served with a nutty Madumbi mash and a fresh passion fruit and palm date relish.
Garlic, the chef says, is his best ingredient.
Visit The Table Bay website for more details.
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