Blythe’s first anniversary fittingly on Spring Day
Blythe Cottage Garden Café, launched on Spring Day 2022, has been open for just over a year.
How appropriate that the anniversary of a garden café is on Spring Day.
Every day of the past year has been a blessing as we have learnt to work together as a multigenerational family and learn something new each day.
Michael Stocks, as chef, and Bongo Ndeleni, as barista, have been a solid team, committed to our vision to create an environment where people can relax, enjoy good food and hot and cold beverages in the ambience of a garden setting.
Our tables made from repurposed scaffolding planks, created by Roger Coates in Port Alfred, have been a feature we continue to treasure, as are the cutlery and sachet boxes with a botanical theme made by Godfrey Howes.
Standerwick Garden Centre have made this venture possible, in a beautiful oasis in the town centre, and we are so grateful to Moon Harvey for the opportunity and her support.
We have enjoyed the support of local news outlets with opportunities to supply vouchers for weekly crosswords and sudoku. We also support local charities with vouchers as prizes.
Tuesday afternoon workshops with a gardening theme every second month, in conjunction with Standerwick Nursery, followed by refreshments from the coffee shop have been informative, entertaining and a wonderful opportunity to build relationships.
Over the past year, we have sourced as many local suppliers as possible for our ingredients.
“Fresh organically grown microgreens come from Birgit Duval from Kenton-on-Sea, bacon from Dave Ford The Meat Man, blue cheese from The Cheese Chic in Bathurst, and honey from Honey Dawn Bee Farm, to mention a few.
The hot sauce “Blaffende Hond” is made by John Tweedie.
Edible flowers for our cakes and sweet pancakes come from our own garden.
Our loyal, frequent customers have been a great source of encouragement to keep doing what we do well and find ways to improve.
Our Uber coffee, chai and hot chocolate come from the Western Cape, highly recommended for its quality and feedback from our customers has been great.
Bongo is passionate about serving good coffee, and his latte art makes every cup special, reinforcing our garden café ethic.
We have tried to listen to our customers and so our menu has evolved over the last year, with Michael adding some creative and flavourful fillings for pancakes, and his homemade burgers with balsamic onion reduction.
Customers can choose what they want as fillings for toasted sandwiches, pancakes, omelettes, or croissants from the options available, according to their taste of diet. Glutenfree bread is available for toasted sandwiches and French toast.
All the baked items are made by Michael. His carrot cake and lemon meringue are unique, and our scones are highly recommended by experts.
We now also offer traditional cold pork pies, quiches, chocolate brownies, pecan nut pies and milk tarts, which are all available as takeaways.
Pecan nut rusks remain a popular item for a take home treat, as are the savoury shortbread cheesies.
If you haven’t been to visit yet, please come and enjoy the experience.
Contacts for our suppliers: Microgreens: Birgit Duval, 072-026-5025, culinarymeetsateleir@gmail. com, Instagram: microgreens_kenton_on_sea
The Cheese Chic: Cherylyn Hoey, 083-7036437, Facebook The Cheese Chic, thecheesechic@gmail.com
The Meat Man: Dave Ford, 083-703-6437 “Blaffende Hond” Hot Sauce: John Tweedie, 083-452-7088.
Honey: Honey Dawn Bee Farm, 046-624-4384