Noble Vice: celebrating the fruits of the harvest

The cultivated and curious will come together in early September for an event that features the best of South Africa’s culinary wizards and specialist wine producers. Noble Vice, a one-day food festival in Woodstock, aims to provide a celebration of the fruits of the harvest. The interactive event is a critical exploration into the noble vices of food and wine, and a celebration of the Western Cape. 

Specialist wine makers from the region are presenting the wines that showcase the new era of wine-making sweeping the Cape. In the viniculture arena, there has been a spate of pioneers who are producing wines using sustainable, organic, or biodynamic practices where the wine is produced with minimal intervention.

Noble Vice offers a rare opportunity to sample the wines from the renegades of the wine industry. The wines from the Swartlands region are highly anticipated, as it was one of the first areas to adopt this new style of wine-making, which has now been followed by many other regions in the country. These new winemakers usually forgo local wine shows, so to find them all under one roof for a day is almost miraculous. There are no entry-level wines being brought to the event, only small-batch and vintage wines. Of particular interest to local enthusiasts are The Sadie Family Wines, Testalonga, Savage Wines and Mullineux, all of which are usually sold abroad.

Progressive wine calls for food to match, and six local chefs have been invited to showcase their own forward-thinking food. The chefs are also providing a glimpse into the breadth and future of culinary trends: everything is on offer: from a vegan dish of entirely foraged ingredients by Chris Erasmus to a whole wild hog, roasted Argentine-style over an open-fire. Wesley Randles has a street-food-style seafood dish up his sleeve, while Dave Schneider is sure to bring heritage produce from Franschhoek for his vegetarian dish. For a taste of Southern barbeque meander over to Callie Louw, and patrons with a sweet tooth will be catered for by chefs André Hill and Henry Vigar, who have planned a range of innovative, bite-size desserts. The chefs will be on hand to dispense food to attendees in a leisurely, informal fine-dining feast of small plates throughout the day.

The event is a true homage to all the producers and people who call the Cape home. It’s a food festival in the truest sense of the word: sure to be full of hedonistic and epicurean pleasures.

If you are in Johannesburg and are already feeling the burn of another lovely thing to do in Cape Town, don’t despair, Neighbourgoods are planning a Highveld excursion in Autumn 2019.

Noble Vice takes place on 9 September, at The Old Biscuit Mill, Woodstock, Cape Town.