Rossouws Restaurants

One of the challenging parts of this job is getting the ground covered. Sometimes I take on double lunches to move along more swiftly, to get to see all the restaurants that may or may not deserve a spot in the guide, or a re-review. Yesterday was a double lunch day. Starting at FSH and continuing at Cranks, both in Rosebank.

Now there are some restaurants you would never compress into a double-header. Yesterday’s were not of that kind. Both FSH and Cranks are flagrantly WSIWYG. FSH is a designer-modern fish eaterie with some pretensions to class (but like many of these, you are safest sticking to the most basic meals, I chose sushi, poor, and fish and chips, good - but also a tomato tart, mistake). Cranks is one of the most idiosyncratic places in Jozi: Thai and Vietnamese cuisine, the place all mad colour and pattern and huge insect sculptures straight out of a William Burrough’s nightmare. The menu is difficult to understand, even when you’re reading the English. The food is often served in plastic crockery, or half a pineapple. And it’s full bore flavour, but not the best ingredients, so all the signification does not add up.

Double lunches. Even if you sample, you feel full from the mental appreciation of all that food.