Foodie Heaven in Cape Town

When I planned our round-the-world itinerary, I knew we would want to balance our periods of slow travel with periods of higher-intensity tourism. Our stay in Europe began with fast-paced scenery changes then gradually slowed to a month-long stay in southern Germany and a leisurely meander through Italy, Spain, France and Belgium to finish our tour of the continent. We shifted into high gear for our eight day tour of Morocco, and to let that experience settle in to our psyches, we rented a beach house in the Camps Bay section of Cape Town, South Africa.

We spent six great nights here. The house was beautiful and very comfortable. Our host was helpful and generous and attentive. The neighbors invited us over for drinks and fireworks views on Guy Fawkes Night (travel serendipity #3, if you’re counting). We woke to Table Mountain cloaked in clouds, took a scenic drive (on the left) down to Boulders Beach to see African penguins and walked to dinner during glowing sunsets. The absolute highlight of our restful stay in Cape Town, though, was the food.

On the first night in town, we walked to the local Pick ’N Pay to buy groceries. Theo cooked a delicious pasta carbonara. The house was incredibly well stocked with cooking utensils and spices, so we ate well that night and each breakfast. Being on the Atlantic seaboard, though, Cape Town does a lot of seafood, so we made sure to eat out for that. We tried a place called The Codfather that is basically a fish market that cooks your selection to order and wraps the dining experience up with a date-night feel. There was Italian and pub food and more along Victoria Road, the main drag in Camps Bay. Our favorite place, though, was breakfast and lunch joint called Baked Bistro.

We ate at Baked at least three times. The food was fresh and comforting. It reminded us of two of our favorite places at home - Sidamo Coffee and Tea in Maple Lawn and Victoria Gastro Pub in Columbia. The staff treated us like favorite regulars, and I was amazed at how quickly this place came to feel like “our place”.

The travel guides and food review sites tell much more about Cape Town’s food scene. Some of the world’s top-rated restaurants are here. We didn’t eat at those, but our sampling of a local slice of the food scene impressed us all the same.