Entertaining Americans

Well, it's been an okay sort of week. Fairly blue. But my neck is feeling mostly better. Thank goodness! It does have the occasional twinge of sensitivity, but I have full range of movement and whatnot. Definitely a plus in my book.

I went to SCM on Tuesday and then last night we took @autumnal_akika's in-laws to dinner. They're out from the States and had a brief 3 night stop in Joburg before heading to Phinda and then down to Cape Town to visit them.

We decided to use 2 of our Entertainer vouchers and take them to BiCE in Hyde Park to get a good view of the sunset. Which we pretty much missed entirely. Luckily it was so clear and beautiful last night that the glow along the horizon lasted for ages and we really enjoyed it.

Sheweee. Cocktails are expensive there. Unnecessarily so, I feel. I mean a Strawberry Daquiri for R70. I can sort of tolerate a R45 cocktail. But (and I assume it's the expensive alcohol you're paying for, or are they importing the strawberries?) who needs anything that expensive going into a cocktail where you can't even taste the alcohol. Wasted on me, that's for sure. But delish, none the less.

We moved into the main restaurant for dinner. We shared their Fritto di Calamari, Zucchine e Funghi con Salsa Piccante e Salsa Tartara (Deep-Fried Baby Falkland Calamari with Zucchini, Mushrooms, Chili and Tartar Sauce, R75) to start. It was an absolutely massive portion and even shared we didn't finish it. It was very tasty tho (aside from those pesky mushrooms - haha). But for that price surely you could get enough sauce to last thru the entire portion, but whatevs.

For mains, I had their Ravioli di Ricotta e Spinaci al Profumo di Tartufo (Homemade Ricotta and Spinach Ravioli served on a Crispy Parmesan Basket with Black Truffles, R140). I'm kinda amazed when their vegetarian dish is more expensive than their prawn one, but I guess it was the Black Truffles (a sufficient portion, I thought).

I quite liked my pasta. I did think it was a little undercooked tho. But when coupled with pieces of the parmesan basket and truffle and sauce, the flavour was superb. And although their starters seem particularly large (again, unnecessarily so, in my opinion), their mains are a neat little portion that was quite manageable for all of us.

And dessert, well who could resist their Cioccolatissimo (Soft Chocolate Soufflé served with Vanilla Ice Cream, R65) ... well no one but The Trucker who tried their Torta di Mele della Nonna BiCE con Gelato alla Cannella (Classic BiCE Apple Pie Served with Cinnamon Ice Cream, R50) which was massive! I didn't try the pie, but the cinnamon ice cream was quite cool :) My souffle was good, the only down side was we'd ordered two and one came with the apple pie & coffees and one arrived after we were almost finished eating. So that was a little bit of a #fail.

The service was good and I think it was a great choice to take our overseas guests. Not sure I'd go back on my own again tho.

As a plus tho, as we were getting up to leave our table, @autumnal_akika's MIL realised she didn't have her handbag and we realised she must've left it at the table we'd started at outside on the deck when we were having drinks. I was a little nervous that they hadn't brought it to us in the restaurant if it'd been found, but we went back thru to the bar area and they had found it. But had taken it to the hotel reception. I gather no one was sure if someone had put it there to "keep the table" or if it had be forgotten so by the time they realised they didn't know who'd been sitting there.

Anyway, alls well that ends well and that really was the cherry on top of our evening :)