The Pavilion at The Marine, Hermanus

My second recent visit to a Liz McGrath hotel, you can read about Cellars-Hohenhort here. The Marine is a beaut of a property, and Pavilion was redecorated about a year ago. It has a conservatory ambience in touches of bamboo green, lamps with a “tree” theme and light green linen, atop a bold black and white tiled floor; all works beautifully to create a soothing space with fantastic lighting and great music (a modern, intelligent selection, far from the usual dreary muzak one hears). The service is warm and friendly (barring the confusion over the telephone as to which days the restaurant was actually open – turns out winter is a lottery: open weekend nights and only in week if enough people book).

The winelist is proudly local (a little too much in my opinion – not much else if you know the Walker Bay wines well) and one odd note was seeing the glass-walled wine cellar, a feature in middle of the restaurant, stand open most of the night. The menu has been pared down from last year’s eight or so starters and a similar number of mains to eight or so in total. That’s always a good sign of focus and attention. Three courses is R250, four R280, six R340; with a surcharge if you desire wine pairings.

The food on the night was generally very good. Standouts were a hazelnut crusted goat’s cheese galette with beets, grapes, rocket and a lovely verjus jelly; also the chocolate fondant with spiced parsnip-honeycomb ice cream and almond pannacotta. Karoo lamb loin was served with stuffed baby cabbage (a little touch of Cape), mash and roast garlic. So the menu moves happily between modern touches like jellies and the classics, prettily plated but not pretentious. More evidence of exective chef Peter Tempelhoff’s successful reinvigoration of the group’s kitchens, here Loran Livesey ably executing the menu.

028 313 1000

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