Three Jo’burg eateries with refreshing new menus that you’ll love this summer
By: Sibongile Nzimande
THE FUSSY VEGAN
New menu
With its cheeky play on the signature coloured discs and Helvetica font of the New York subway system signage, this vegan haven located at a filling station in Randburg is both trippy and hippy in the most refreshing way. The Fussy Vegan’s shiny white subway mosaic wall tiles and almost clinically pared-back interior give the feeling of being in transit. And that is perhaps the point, whether you choose to sit on a wooden bench while waiting for your juicy takeaway seitan rib burger, or relax at one of the round metal tables to tuck into a quick pulled mushroom toasted sarmie. The new menu includes more scrummy burgers, a soya-based boerie roll and unconventional bowls, such as mac and cheese (made with cashew cheese sauce); lentil lasagne layered with mushroom sauce; and a burrito bowl featuring refried beans, salsa, black rice and sour cream.
Pricing Dishes from R40 to R85 | Favourite dish Spicy breakfast burrito with scrambled tofu, seitan bacon, avo and salsa, R55 | Caltex Waterfall, Jan Smuts Avenue, Blairgowrie | facebook.com/thefussyvegan
EST EST ALEA
New restaurant & menu
Cube Chef Dario Di Angeli has gone rogue … well, as rogue as a chef known for his molecular gastronomy-inspired dishes can go when he turns to classic cooking in his new restaurant. Each dish on the menu of Est Est Alea – which means “It’s still Cube” – is a reawakening of flavours and senses, created to make the eater imagine what it must be like to eat and experience flavour for the first time. An à la carte menu is available at lunchtime from Tuesday to Saturday, and a tasting menu is offered at dinner from 7pm at R800 per head for a full tasting menu, or R500 for a half tasting menu. Particularly interesting on the current full tasting menu is the Christmas pudding-stuffed quail with harissa, dukkah and kuri pumpkin paste; and the line fish Jamaican jerk condiment, with soy foam, pineapple and fennel (on both tasting menus).
Pricing Main dishes from R160 to R200 | Favourite dish From the à la carte menu, ostrich fillet with red pepper taffy, pomegranate, raspberry paper, seeds and nuts, R190 | Parknorth Heights, 17 4th Avenue, Parktown North | estestalea.co.za
JAMIE’S ITALIAN
New menu
Consistent with the restaurant’s ethos of using sustainably sourced and seasonal ingredients, a menu refresher every few months is par for the course. This summer, the kitchen has turned up the heat a few degrees, with the entry of the Fico al Gorgonzola e Spinaci pizza – a lip-smacking combination of fresh wild figs, baby spinach and gorgonzola cheese on Jamie’s Italian’s signature home-made, hand-stretched pizza base. New to the grills section are a herby and tender roast rack of lamb, as well as a humungous Jamie’s 1kg T-bone that’s been aged in-house (to share), served with two sides and a house salad.
Pricing Non-sharing mains from R110 to R280 | Favourite dish Ultimate sharing plank – mortadella, schiacciata piccante, arancini, Italian nachos, buttermilk squid, mini buffalo mozzarella, olive and pickles, slaw, olive tapenade and grissini sticks, R650 | Shop 00513, Building 13, High Street, Melrose Arch | jamieoliver.com/italian/south-africa
WORDS Sibongile Nzimande
