In the kitchen: View at the Four Seasons Hotel, The Westcliff
View has a fresh new head chef and we joined him in the kitchen to learn how he makes some of his signature dishes off his new menu
Farrel Hirsch gingerly holds an egg in his hand as he balances over a basket of fried sweet potato.
“This get’s fun in service time,” he quips as he gently tries to move the egg in place with one clean movement.
But alas the egg falls and cracks runny yolk all over his already beautiful creation. Ever the professional his hands move quickly to clean up the damage and soon he is deshelling another egg in his hands.
It’s this moment that reminds me of that famous Julia Child quote as she fails to flip her potato pancake.
“You can always pick it up if you’re alone in the kitchen, who is going to see?”
But now all eyes are on Hirsh as he heads up the kitchen at View Restaurant at the Four Seasons Hotel at the Westcliff. He was snatched up from under Luke Dale-Roberts at The Test Kitchen to breathe new life into this local legendary establishment.
“I got a phone call and they sold me this idea. I was like; Oh, you want to make top 10? Ok cool, where in Cape Town are you?” He recalls as he finely places one of three capers onto his Wagu Beef dish. “There was this pause on the phone, before they told me they were in Joburg. They flew me out here to check it out and that was it.”
A well-earned spot in a career that started at the age of 17 in Brighton, England. He had run away from school to the shoreline and was working as a roadie. He still swears that he could have become a rock star “if he tried” he scoffs as he cuts into Wagu loin that costs R700/a kilo.
Instead he happened to date the daughter of knighted chef and British restaurateur legend, Roy Ackerman who would take around his kitchens and restaurants and it just sparked something in Hirsh.
“I always loved food, I would always eat something, I would never turn my nose up at it and I was amazed at what he had done with his life. He was an orphan and started working in a scullery at 12 and there he was knighted for having 12 restaurants which all have Michelin stars. 17 year old me was dumbfounded and wondered if I could maybe do the same.”
Ackerman was also the old boss of Luke Dale-Roberts, who would eventually inspire Hirsch with his pursuit of Korean flavours. In fact there is a lot of Asian influence in View’s new set menu. Profiles he picked up as he traveled through Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Myanmar and India but only really honed when he started working in The Greenhouse in the Cape and the Test Kitchen.
“I just find that everyone has eaten a piece of steak or an egg before. It’s very normal to have these things. When a western palette is bombarded with Asian flavours it’s a lot different and quite nice.
This bombardment is acutely found in the first dish on that set menu called The Hen’s Egg. Here’s how he makes it:
This is like a play on an Eggs Florentine. We use all the components that are in the dish but just tweaked it slightly.
Instead of a potato or a rosti that you would normally have for breakfast, we do a sweet potato nest that sits around it. I line up discs of pre-prepped sweet potato and roll them up like in a roulade to slice them up.