A Fantasy of Gastronomy

Location:
South Africa, Cape Town

seafood lunch

By Stephanie Katz

It was my third day in Cape Town and I was having difficulty shaking off the morning haze from what seemed like a semi-permanent jet lag and understanding why I was already leaving a place to which I had just arrived. I had hardly scratched the electric varnish of this city and here I was being asked to take a day trip. But, at the other’s prodding I tied on a bathing suit I felt in no position to wear, protectively placed my over-sized sunglasses over my swollen eyes, and worked on masticating the dried ostrich sausage that would be breakfast - little can come between South Africans and their beloved meat, at any hour. And so it was, we embarked beyond the hustle of Cape Town’s meandering highways and moderate skyscrapers to enter the territory of grassy banked plains and broken dirt hills.

My head almost immediately cleared with the wonder of open space. Hidden vistas of white sand beaches running to keep up with the shimmer of the Atlantic peeped their heads around the tidal rhythms of the landscape. Birds in perfect geometric patterns rose and fell in some unseen harmony with the levels of air currents, their closeness seeming false against the distant countours of Cape Town’s chakra point, Table Mountain.

Suddenly, I had what was the first impulse of realization…This Is Africa.

I turned to share my light bulb and saw the others were marinating in their own versions of silent awe, faces glued to windows absorbing the bold horizons, the variations in texture, the tricks only light can play – no one seemed to be breathing.

At an unobtrusive forgotten break in the road we turned off and followed the dust covered sideways sign for Langebaan – the old fishing village lying prostrate up Cape Town’s sun-baked coastline. After two unsuccessful attempts to find and follow the unmarked road that would lead us to the destinations edge, we found what we were searching for hidden behind a driftwood fence that looked less man-made and more like the girdle of mother-nature herself.

Die Strandloper was an open-air surfside seafood restaurant needing no more advertisement than it needed roof over its head.

“Do you understand,” asked Reyana, my beautiful coffee colored South African friend. “Do you understand how wonderful this day will be?”

You always wanted to understand Reyana, and this being the first time I’d met her and the first mission of many we would embark upon, I waved her away, yes, yes I understand – today will be a good day – now where is the toilet.

We walked through an outdoor hallway of fishing net straddling pock-marked water gourds and stained wooden posts decorated with a captain’s pocket change – a buoy here, a starfish there, and anchor hanging lazily from the green canvas of the makeshift roof. The hallway ended we were handed plastic cups and invited to make ourselves comfortable for the freshly caught ten course seafood meal to come.

The restaurant itself unraveled before us: a collection of handcarved benches, oversized rope spools turned sideways as tables, the innards and skeletons of old jetties and larger ships lying mangled on the rocky shoreline, two monstrous black iron cauldrons dangling dangerously over open fires, and the surf line of the Atlantic’s beckoning blue waters a barefoot stroll before us.

At noon a weathered looking seafarer rang the rusty bell centered amidst the buffet tables boasting freshly baked bread, farm butter and an assortment of homemade jams. We collected our paper plate, our mussel shell cutlery, and embarked upon the gastronomical journey of a lifetime.

Every forty-five minutes there after we were summoned from the lazy conversion of our party and the floating chords of in house guitar folk singers to congregate around the table for juicy mussels marinated in onion and garlic, uniquely South African fish dishes that included braaied snoek with potatoes and patats, waterbloemmetjie bredie, smoked angelfish, stompneus with a thrilling spice seasoning, kreef, and a finale of crayfish tail glowing red above the burning coals.

The day was intoxicating –surrounded by what were already wonderful friends, euphoric amongst the left-over aromas of meal marinating in our midst – we digested our contentment with the last of the sauvignon blanc and uncontainable laughter.

We lumbered sleepily full, glowingly at ease from the world of the seaman and back into the millennium of shiny fast things – ready for a nap, a drive back to Cape Town and the excitement of the night to come.

And it was only then, when the golden orb of sunshine reclined lower and lower over the horizon, and the sky became a palatte of blush red streaks, fiery orange strokes and faint tinges of pale violets, it was then, that I think I truly began to understood, This richness, This closeness, This Beauty…This Is Africa.