SUIP!

Cape Town is market city; Hout Bay is market town. Just down the road from the tourist trap stalls of the decades-old Lions Craft Market and yappy curio sellers by Mariners Wharf is a colourful and gratifyingly authentic indoor market.

In an old harbourside warehouse, made complete with wafts of rotting fish from nearby factories and docks, a hundred or so vendors of all kinds set up shop to form what is perhaps Hout Bay’s best shopping experience. (It’d be its best eating experience too, if it weren’t for Massimo’s.). Although seemingly only a godsend in comparison with Hout Bay’s other marina markets, the truth is that the Bay Harbour Market is one of the Western Cape’s best: chic but relaxed; free of posturing and entirely good-natured; buzzing but never uncomfortable.

Great produce is accompanied by craft beer supplied by Keg King. This past weekend featured local favourites Darling along with the ever-improving Napier and ever-present stalwarts Paulaner. Everson’s craft cider is also available across from the beer. Gourmet sandwiches and R15 hotdogs sit together comfortably ten metres away. Live music wafts over the busy stalls. The smoke from fried sausages and brewing coffee mingle easily in the seaside air.

But don’t let me spoil the surprises for you. Rather, let these photographs whet your appetite for a wonderful day out. The Bay Harbour Market is open Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Follow @bayharbourmkt, too.

Just watch out for the dive-bombing seagulls in the parking lot.

There’s a well-worn staircase off the sidewalk towards the top end of Long Street. Down a dark corridor, barricaded by a broad-shouldered, black-suited bouncer, these stairs used to mark the entrance to Zula, a bar and live music venue which was the clown car of Long Street: no matter how full it already was of straight-fringed girls and James Dean-coiffed boys in second-hand leather jackets, it would always get fuller.

Sensing a need for larger premises, Zula relocated to more spacious and grandiose settings literally a few blocks down the road half a year ago. For months club-goers wondered what would take its place.

Gone is the floor worn down from thousands of pairs of tapping sneakers and pointy shoes, the wide, shallow stage and dark walls. In its place is light, light and more light. The staircase is surrounded by heart-stenciled walls. Tobasco bottles and pepper shakers hang from the ceiling as chandeliers. Brick walls and concrete floors against pastel blue walls. Gone is the smoke from hand-rolled cigarettes. Instead the scent of dough and napolitana sauce wafts around the patrons.

This is Sgt Pepper. (Lonely hearts jokes mercifully absent.)

It’s spacious and airy, eschewing the dinginess and busyness coveted by so many Long Street eateries. An open-plan kitchen looks over a handful tables. Through a door off of the main dining room is a small bar, in which tutu-ed men in the midst of long bachelors’ parties can sometimes be found. A foosball table awaits next door. The balcony is long and simple – almost unembellished save for the mismatched chairs and exterior metalwork.

It’s another one in a line of ‘refined’ rock ‘n roll eateries, not completely dissimilar to Saints, only one street away, and which I reviewed last week.

It loses to Saints on beer, though. Sgt Pepper’s beer selection is passable – SAB bottles and Jack Black, Milk Stout and Black Label on tap – but it’s partially made up for by a pleasingly inexpensive and varied – if not particularly nuanced wine list. House wine is R15 and quaffable. An inexpensive and inoffensive alcoholic option is always well received.

But it’s not as if the food is nuanced, either. Resorting to the classic pizza/pasta/burger/salad-based menu, Sgt Pepper relies on variations on a theme and not outright innovation. Pleasingly, what they do is very good. Pizzas are thin-based and crack delightfully with each bite. Toppings are generous, cooked well and combined in simple, effective combinations. (The Pappa Prawn is king, littered with chunky and juicy crustaceans and smothered in fresh and sweet chili. It’s really good.) It could all be best described as rustic, reasonably-priced and completely suited to the venue’s atmosphere and aesthetic.

True, Sgt Pepper isn’t exactly a top-drawer culinary or beery experience, but it still manages to be delightfully bright and a decent night out. The evolution of these rooms from rock bar to rock diner has been swift and complete. Perhaps the spirit of the old Zula is still alive here. It’ll be interesting to see how Sgt Pepper develops over the course of the coming year.

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Sgt Pepper

194 Long Street, Cape Town

It’s not strictly beer-related, but it should go hand-in-hand: support your local market. Respect for local produce, artisanship and small-batch craft is the foundation of craft beer. Without it, we wouldn’t have amazing things to eat or drink.

Starlings Café, a favourite spot of mine on Belvedere Road in Rondebosch East, has a tiny but useful market in their back garden every Wednesday. I went and bought some inexpensive and delicious angelfish from Ocean Jewels, a SASSI-approved dealer, and browsed through preserves, organic meat, eggs and butter, and a handful of other delicious-looking things (as well as interacting with a lemonade saleswoman who seemed very suspicious of my claims to being a beer writer. Thanks for the sip of lemonade, if you ever read this, suspicious lady.)

It’s not as expensive as you think. It only requires a little effort, but the rewards of browsing at markets, large or small, are endless: they’re inspiring, fun and, hell, you’ll probably even get a good meal out of it.

Spiga D’Oro, on Durban’s Florida Road, is almost certainly the city’s number one Italian eatery, if not for quality, then certainly for quantity. It used to be small: a tiny but vibrant pavement eatery on Florida Road, a place that didn’t take reservations and put out superlative antipasti, pizza and pasta inexpensively until the wee hours. It has more than once been described to me as the place where Morningside chefs went after dinner service. After all, there are very few places in this town where you can get a good sit-down meal past midnight, unless you call eating a chip-triple-cheese roti cross-legged on the pavement of Sparks Road a “good sit-down meal”. (I would happily count myself as someone who does, however.)

Not too long ago Spiga expanded, and now the restaurant encompasses a large fountain courtyard area round the back from the original premises. With all of this space, you would imagine that you wouldn’t have to wait long for a table. Although Spiga say that waiting for a table is ‘part of the experience’ of eating there, my friends and I were forced to wait, on a not-so-busy weekday night, for an hour in a dingy and uncomfortable waiting bar until a table became available round the front.

But when you’re finally called by the doorman (via cellphone, no less) to your table, things immediately look up. The decor in the main restaurant is warm and casual. One wall is given to permanent marker scrawlings; the rest to posters, pictures and memorabilia. It’s very comfortable, even if the seating can be a bit tight.

As one of the few visible proponents of the now-faltering We Love Real Beer brand in Durban, it’s one of the few places you can expect an above-average beer list. That’s not saying it’s spectacular: it comprises of SAB bottles and Amstel draught, a selection from B&U and two beers from Birra Moretti. The Birra Moretti La Rossa is my go-to: it’s European, as is &Union’s offerings, but is a tad cheaper and goes very well with tomato-based dishes.

And man, is the food good. Choose between small, medium or large portions from the pizza and pasta menus, but always expect to be served, well, more than what you were expecting. I ordered a medium tagliatelle pescatore and was pleased to receive perfectly cooked pasta with enough prawns and peppers to leave me satisfied. Unless you’re absolutely ravenous, a medium portion really should be able to do you. Expect to pay about R80 per person for mains and beer.

All in all, while Spiga d’Oro is flawed, and – as the axiom goes – ain’t what it used to be,  it’s still reasonably priced, well-positioned and puts out consistent and delicious food that draws scores back to it seemingly every hour of every night. Its success can be measured in its popularity: unlike many things in the world of food and beverages, it seems that popular opinion is worth something this time.