How Cape Town Became The Food Capital of the World

When Cape Town was voted the Best City for Food in the World by Condé Nast Traveller readers, it wasn’t so much a surprise as a cause for celebration that the rest of the world recognised what we already know! The Mother City’s food scene has gone from hot to next level; it’s home to so many different and delicious food experiences, you can dine out daily and never suffer from a jaded palate.

There’s an exuberance and inventiveness to our culinary landscape… perhaps due to Cape Town’s relative youth as a dining destination.

“The Cape Town scene is so amazing because of the creativity here,” says Peter Tempelhoff (of Fyn, Beyond and Ramenhead). “I think back to the early 2000s, when we could hardly get any ingredients… We had to produce fantastic dishes with very basic ingredients. This really challenged chefs to create magic with what we had. And although we now have anything we could ever want as chefs, I think this mindset has remained in the industry, and we are doing so much more with the items at our disposal.”

Liam Tomlin of the Chefs Warehouse group agrees. “There is a tremendous amount of talent in and around Cape Town as there is throughout South Africa,” he says. “Since arriving here almost 20 years ago, I have experienced a big shift in how much our industry has become a profession rather than a job. The standard right across the board has lifted tenfold: our service standard, wine appreciation, wine service, interior design, food offering, ingredients. We are on par with any major city in the world. And with regards to location, we have so much more to offer when it comes to choice of dining venues.”

From fine dining to street food, there’s an infinite spectrum of flavours to discover.  We narrowed it down to 10 reasons why we’ll never get tired of eating our way around Cape Town.

A diversity of food cultures

Our rainbow nation comprises so many different cultures, all of which find expression in our cuisine. And as a port city connected to the rest of the world throughout South Africa’s history, Cape Town is a natural melting pot of food influences. “Our food has been touched by the Javanese Malays, Portuguese, Dutch, French Huguenots, India the English and further back the Bantus, the Khoi and originally the San,” says Peter. “This is actually where fusion food originated and it remains in our culinary DNA and is passed on from one generation of cooks to the next.”

Discover Cape Malay spices, curries, roties and samosas; Afrikaans boerekos farm comfort food with apricot konfyt, jaffels, and vetkoek; Xhosa staples of samp and beans, amasi and umphokoqo (mealie pap); shisanyama and braai fire-cooking that is a national tradition with a firm place in all the country’s cultures. And national favourites that have long since been shared between cultures such as chakalaka, boerewors and bobotie. Durban Indian curry and bunny chows, an overflow of Portuguese peri-peri from Mozambique, a flourish of Mediterranean influences from Italian and Greek communities, the English traditions of afternoon tea and Sunday roasts, and so much more.

Our natural resources

The scent of fynbos is guaranteed to make any South African living abroad yearn for home… Cape Town is set in a truly unique botanical biome that lends flavour to its cuisine, whether it’s the flavours of buchu or wild fynbos herbs seasoning a dish, or Karoo lamb that has grazed on fynbos-covered mountains.

Then there are the surrounding oceans for a rich variety of seafood and beach foraging and, just as important, a sunshiney Mediterranean climate.  “If you distil it right back to its grassroots, the seasons are what ultimately drive creativity,” says Luke Dale Roberts (Salon, Pot Luck Club and Test Kitchen Fledglings).  “We’ve got four distinct seasons in Cape Town and with them come in a bounty of beautiful ingredients.”

A variety of restaurant styles

Trail-blazing fine-dining restaurants at world-class level might be what draws the foodie traveller to Cape Town, but once here you’ll discover the passion for provenance and flavour hits right at so many different styles of eatery. “Cape Town is an incredibly strong all-rounder when it comes to food cities,” says John Norris-Rogers (Pier, La Colombe group). “ We have a beautiful backdrop with various different food offerings, from great food markets to niche restaurants to high-end fine dining, and great options within each category making great food accessible whenever you feel like it.” Explore farm tables with set menus served family-style, informal bistros, artisanal pizzerias, streetfood outlets, food trucks and farmers’ markets. Each one offers an individual and personal take on South African ingredients, flavours and local vibes.

Viticulture on our doorstep

On one side we have beaches, on the other Cape Town is fringed by vineyards. Cool ocean breezes and a diverse terroir of mountain slopes, hills, soils and aspects make for a varied and pulsing winescape, spanning established estates going back through the centuries, international award-winning producers, and cutting-edge young winemakers pushing the boundaries of minimal intervention wine-making. “The incredible wine production and curatorship of superb wines here is definitely a factor making it such a unique food destination,” says Luke. Chefs and sommeliers have all these wines to play with in their pairings and wine lists, maximising the local flavour and taking diners on a fascinating journey of food and wine.

Pioneering people

Our chefs are a pioneering bunch, pushing boundaries, experimenting with food techniques new and old. “When I arrived at La Colombe all those years ago,” recalls Luke, “there was only a handful of fine-dining restaurants, but it’s just grown and grown. A number of key chefs have contributed to that… There’s this bandwidth of superb chefs that have trained under great chefs and subsequently gone out on their own and started to grow brands of their own. There’s a strong spirit of entrepreneurship in South Africa.”

And there are many more unsung heroes expanding our knowledge and bringing new indigenous flavours to the fore: foraging queen Roushanna Gray, expert in wild indigenous edibles, Loubie Rusch, small-scale farmer Iming Lin, chef and forager Kobus van der Merwe. The work these and many others do brings more and more unique foods and flavours of the Cape into our cuisine.

Local diners are another important factor on our culinary landscape. “We are a people who like to eat well!” says chef and food writer Karen Dudley. “And we are quite demanding of flavour and texture and excitement! We like surprise. And we are by nature, boundary breakers and innovators. Our chefs are hungry and curious and bold.”

Proximity to provenance

Hyperlocal may be the latest buzz word but it really is possible to source all your fresh seasonal ingredients close to home in and around Cape Town. Urban farms within the city, a rich variety of specialist growers in the surrounding Winelands and farmlands, plus raisers of happy pigs, free-range chickens, grass-fed wagyu and Angus cattle, and small-scale fishing communities like Abalobi. “When I first arrived here you couldn’t find Jerusalem artichokes or celeriac, they’re commonplace now,” says Luke. “You can go to places like Oranjezicht food market and have the most unbelievable array of seasonal ingredients at your fingertips.”

All these sustainability-minded producers have grown in happy symbiosis with the flourishing restaurant industry over the past two decades as chefs seek out suppliers and ingredients that match their ethos and grow for flavour. “Spoilt as we are for good produce, we love our vegetables and our cheese, interesting use of spices,” says Karen. “The Cape is all about freshness, bright flavour and juxta-positioning! I love tamarind, jaggery, cardamom, a bitter leaf, star anise, a toasted almond, a crispy caper, fine cheese, a ghee-slicked curry leaf.

Indigenous ingredients

Chefs looking to give their cuisine a definite sense of place are exploring the wealth of indigenous African ingredients available. Foraged ingredients, seaweeds and shellfish from the intertidal zones, wild herbs and leaves from the mountainside, the edible Cape pond weed that gives us our traditional late-winter waterblommetjie bredie. Peter Tempelhoff lists among his favourite indigenous ingredients our antelope (springbok, impala, gemsbok), prenia leaf, garlic buchu, kingklip and kei apples.

Global influences

Cape Town may sit on the southern tip of the vast African continent, but it doesn’t languish in grand isolation. Young chefs work overseas, take part in international competitions such as S. Pellegrino Young Chef Academy. Established chefs travel to other countries in our off season exploring foreign cuisines. And chefs from elsewhere visit Cape Town, fall in love and come back to stay.

“I think all local chefs look to Europe, Asia and America for inspiration because of the level they are cooking at,” says Peter. “We, however, need to be clever enough to not copy chefs’ dishes verbatim, but to be inspired by them to start new trains of thought, which hopefully lead to something new and potentially great. Our story is worth telling in our own voice, but it needs the grounding of international standards for it to be properly appreciated by our foreign foodie visitors and local diners alike.”

Artisans on the rise

Two decades ago the artisanal food scene in South Africa was in its infancy. Now it’s full-fledged and bubbling with energy. “The ingredients available and the artisan producers have exponentially grown over the years,” says Luke. “I feel the chefs have driven that, but it’s also the artisan producers themselves. It’s become a real melting pot of creativity.” You’ll discover dedicated sourdough bakers, old-school cheesemakers, charcuterie whizzes, vinegar-makers, cold-pressed olive oils and a whole lot more. And all these wonderful, hand-crafted products give our chefs even more delicious local flavours and ingredients to work with.

The unparalleled setting

It’s a truth universally acknowledged that a beautiful setting makes the food experience even better. When you’re sitting looking out over mountain slopes and vineyards, or listening to the wash of ocean waves, and eating food and wine sourced from those very landscapes, you feel even more connected to the stories told on the plate. And when it comes to setting, Cape Town really can’t be beaten.

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