The Western Cape winter is a good time to launch a fire-based restaurant, particularly one with a snug and toasty interior, almost cellar-like, with wheaten walls and a fireplace ablaze, like a getaway lair for bons vivants.
The hardest part about finding SMEUL, located in the Zomerlust Boutique Hotel, is the length of Paarl’s main road. Swinging off the highway and arriving in the town, you’re tricked into thinking you’re almost there; taste buds start pricking in anticipatory relish. But patience is required: it is officially the longest contiguous main road in a South African city or town. Thankfully — eventually — Zomerlust isn’t hard to spot; the hotel’s signature classic yellow 1950s Rolls-Royce is parked outside to flag the destination.
Formally translated from Afrikaans, “smeul” is the smoulder of a fire. The restaurant’s chef-patron, Kevin Grobler, imputes a more cheffy meaning: the aroma of the sizzle from food on coals. Why would an award-winning chef who has headed up Michelin-starred kitchens, including JAN in Nice, France, want to abandon gas stovetops and electric ovens? In a sense, it’s about going back to basics, rekindling the passion of his roots: “This is how I started cooking, as a boy, over a fire,” he says.
This is going to be interesting, I think, vowing to keep an open mind, because I am probably the only South African man who is neither in love with braaied food nor keen on braaing.
O, ye of little faith … Grobler’s confidence and skill really shine through in the vegetable dishes. These comprise no fewer than three of the five starters and all four side dishes. There’s probably no more humble — some would say humdrum — vegetable than the beetroot, but the fire-roasting technique transforms earthiness into sweetness and dense texture into velvety delectability. The “smeul” flavour is augmented by smoked coconut yoghurt and balanced by pickled variations of the vegetable, as well as mint.
The cauliflower risotto is even more innovative. The dish’s characteristic al dente chew is inevitably sacrificed, but the creaminess is there, and there’s more flavour than in many traditional arborio- or carnaroli-based versions: dukkah spicing, crumbled hazelnuts, and a saffron foam.
We also try the fire-roasted eggplant, which is listed as a main course — unsurprisingly so, given that a whole specimen is presented like a steak, with appropriate charring and skirting strips of satiny white flesh resembling fat. The reddish sauce of harissa and feta is a touch of genius, mimicking the vibrancy of chimichurri as a wonderful beef accompaniment — or perhaps mocking South Africa’s much-loved monkey gland.
Grobler tells me that fish is trickiest to get right on fire and coals, but my wife rates her yellowtail as one of the most memorable seafood dishes she’s ever enjoyed. Then, around us, giant plates of SMEUL’s signature dish, the assiette of beef, start arriving. It’s a spectacle: trails of smoke; quietened tables as diners pause conversations; concentration on waiters’ faces. The theatre continues as another troop of servers follow, holding steaming, conical silver implements, like a blacksmith’s tools from a bygone era. Tap, tap… Repeat… Bone marrow hisses out, poured over the T-bones. I’m now convinced: this is a cut above a braai.
My favourite main, however, is the char sui pork belly. The meat is unctuous, made sticky by the caramel-and-savoury Chinese-style sauce, with its aromatic five-spice notes. The plate, with baby corn, charred corn, corn puree and pickled gooseberries as accompaniments, is a picture: bold and bright, yet elegantly simple.
Indeed, the experience of classy cuisine often starts with other perceptions: the venue’s décor, its ambience, perhaps a sense of history, and the impression of attention to detail. Zomerlust has just been renovated, and a wander around the hotel is also rewarding. Paarl-based interior designer Misi Overturf — the creative flair behind restaurant transformations in the TV programme In die Sop — has worked magic throughout the space.
At Zomerlust, then, it’s evident that the place — the Boland winelands, the historic town, the beautifully restored and reimagined 18th-century building — inspires what emerges from the kitchen. Even in the dessert offerings, there’s something of the flair of fire and smoke. A Basque cheesecake has that requisite scorched surface; the caramelised, burnt bitterness is softened by sweet pumpkin and complemented by a pear chutney. There’s more theatre when a citrus meringue is presented. This dessert needs a better description on the menu, because it’s a complex version, or a deconstruction, of a lemon meringue pie. The waiter briefly places a burning coal on the meringue to singe the sugary egg whites. It’s an appropriate way to visualise “smeul” — and far more dramatic than resorting to that overused blowtorch.
SMEUL’s focus on fire-based cuisine is novel, but, departing and driving back along the many kilometres of Paarl’s main road, I ponder its year-round sustainability. This part of the Cape is blistering in summer. Smartly, the restaurant’s menu is compact — surely to allow for seasonal flexibility — so it will be interesting to see how Grobler’s menu flexes when the kitchen gets seriously hot. Still, the assiette of beef signature dish will be a permanent fixture, no doubt — and he has converted me, in a way, to the pleasures of a braai.
Zomerlust Boutique Hotel, 193 Main Road, Hoog-en-Droog, Paarl
Wanted
