Independent on Saturday

Trying to be all things to all people

La Parada

1 Palm Blvd, uMhlanga Ridge Daily 8am to 11pm 031 941 6008 FRANK CHEMALY frank.chemaly@inl.co.za

Shongweni Farmers’ and Craft Market: (today) Fun and safe family outing in the country from 6.30am to 12.30pm. Full Covid-19 protocols. Fresh produce, crafts, ready-made foods, decor items, furniture, pet products, outdoor goods, nursery and jewellery. Call 031 777 4686. Musgrave Market: (today) Under the trees at Berea Park for food, music and stalls selling arts and crafts, clothing, accessories, confectionery, baked goods, books, toys, plants, good quality second-hand items and more. From 9am to 2pm.

Golden Hours Market: (tomorrow) A relaxed familyfriendly market under the mango trees at Golden Hours School from 10am to 2pm. Live music and food stalls. All Covid-19 protocols in place. Call Lyn at 083 262 3693. uMhlanga Farmers Market: Autumn Drive, Prestondale, every Wednesday from 8am to noon. Call Ethel at

060 303 3957.

Windermere Antiques Fair: Catch the first fair of the year on January 29 at the Windermere Centre from 8.30am to 2pm. Around 20 dealers will be selling a wide selection of antiques, vintage and collectibles, including porcelain, glass, crystal, jewellery, silver, records, books, paintings, linen, old toys, etc. Interesting treasures of yesteryear at prices to suit all pockets. Call Helen Clementz on 084 241 0241.

Rhumbelow, Durban: (today and tomorrow) Rhumbelow Classics Cinema features a Shakespeare season with the screening of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s latest productions recorded live in Stratford-on-Avon. Until January 23 at 6pm, or 2pm on Sundays. Shows include and

Roland on 082 499 8636 or email roland@stansell.co.za or visit https://events.durbantheatre.com/ for details.

Protea Fire & Ice, uMhlanga: (today) Catch Chester Missing and Conrad Koch live in uMhlanga in Ramapuppet at 7.30pm. Tickets R125 from Quicket

Rhumbelow, Durban: Rhumbelow Classic Cinemas offers a cinema wind-up featuring a final showing of the musicals and stage shows that featured in December. Running from January 25 to 30, shows include The Three Tenors, An

Computicket or call Roland on 082 499 8636 or email roland@stansell.co.za or visit https://events.durbantheatre. com/ for details.

Rhumbelow, Tina’s: Back by popular demand is The Chain – The Fleetwood Mac Story starring Barry Thomson, Dawn Selby, Mali Sewell, Andy Turrell, Colin Peddie and Marion Loudon. The Fleetwood Mac story spans more than 30 years, starting in 1967 as a British blues band that later became a California-based pop group in the mid-70s. January 28, 29 at 7pm, January 30 at 2pm. Tickets R180 from Computicket or call Roland on 082 499 8636, or email roland@stansell.co.za

Parkview Hotel: It’s Comedy O’Clock with an all-KZN line-up of comedians to get us some much-deserved laughter therapy. Featuring Pius Xulu, Flymotion, Nonto R Mmangaliso Mhlongo, Annie Botha and Melissa Jhinku. January 29 at 7pm. Tickets R120 from Quicket.

Music Revival: (today) Pianist Christopher Duigan livestreams classical concerts at 6pm every Saturday and a more intimate playlist in his Piano Hour on Wednesdays at 6pm on https://www.youtube.com/c/ChristopherDuigan. Barnyard Theatre: (final show today) Strictly No 1s is a roller-coaster ride through 60 years of No 1 hit songs that made us dance, sing, cry and party ‘till sunrise. Featuring a 10-member cast who will take you back to the hit parade on radio stations around the world. Final show today at 7pm. Bookings at https://www.barnyardtheatre.co.za Alliance Française de Durban: Jazz pianist Burton Naidoo launches his latest album, Sometime Before, on January 27 at 6pm. Tickets R60 from Webtickets.

The Luthuli Museum: Singers/songwriters Nosihe and Khokho Madlala perform on January 28 at 6pm. Tickets R40 on Webtickets. Also performing at the KZNSA Gallery on January 29 at 6pm. Tickets R60.

St Thomas Church, Musgrave: Aristide du Plessis (cello), Myfanwy Price (oboe) and Andrew Warburton (piano) will perform a programme of Beethoven, Bruch and Poulenc on January 30 at 11am. Tickets R100/R80 pensioners and students, must be pre-booked from Patti on 079 564 5230. KZNSA: Singers Zawadi Yamugu, Rowan Stuart and Neo Dube live in concert on February 4 at 6pm. Tickets R60 from Webtickets.

Margate Municipal Art Museum: Catch Nozibusiso Vezi live in concert on February 5 at 6pm. Tickets R50 from Webtickets.

KZNSA Gallery: Opening of eBhish, a solo exhibition by Luvuyo Equiano Nyawose, who will have a walkabout today at 10am. Nyawose, using photographs and a video installation taken on the eThekwini beachfront between 2018 and 2020, contextualises the space looking at how the legacies of colonialism and apartheid echo in many forms of social practice in contemporary South Africa. Open Tuesday to Sunday.

The Green Gallery: (today) New collection featuring artists Shirley Brandon, Angelika Anastasis, Nicole Pletts, Andy Anderson and Penny Brown, including sculptures by Owen Llewellyn Davies and Sarah Richards. Flanders Mall, Mount Edgecombe. Call 031 502 2757.

The Gallery: In collaboration with the African Arts Centre, an array of visual arts introducing new artists, and with well known artists from KZN. Call 072 245 8691.

Amblers Hiking Club: (tomorrow) Away hike this weekend. At 2pm on January 30 hike the new Gorge trail at Highstakes. R40 hike fee includes tea and famous chocolate cake afterwards. Call David at 072 615 0559. Cycle Club: Meet every Tuesday at the Mini Town car park on North Beach at 9am for a cycle on the promenade. Call Ian at 083 675 2125.

Umgeni Steam Railway: Take a scenic trip from Kloof Railway Station for a 1-hour, 25km steam trip through the Valley of 1000 Hills to Inchanga. Free entry to Railway Museum in the Old Station Master’s House, and entrance into the Modeller’s Shed. The Inchanga Station Craft Market operates when the train runs. Leaves Kloof on January 29 and 30 at 8.30am and 12.30pm. Ticket adults R290/pensioners and children (2-12) R200/ family package (two adults and two children): R880 from www. umgenisteamrailway.com

Crocworld, Scottburgh: NPO 4 Paws and a Tale is hosting its Valentine’s Day event at the conservation centre’s Fish Eagle Café on February 12, for the first time in two years since Covid struck. This event brings in much-needed funds to feed and care for the area’s most vulnerable strays. Chef Morne van Zyl will cook a mouthwatering three-course meal hosted in the open-air deck with captivating sea views. Guests will enjoy some fun spot prizes as well as an exciting auction. From 6 for 6.30pm. Tickets R180 from The Tale End shop in Scott Street. Booking essential.

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UMHLANGA’S new kid on the block is a swanky affair. Its airy, open terrace buzzes on a sunny afternoon; inside is dominated by a giant bar along one wall – with some very premium labels – and the kitchen brigade is hard at work down the other.

There’s comfy table seating around the bar with Spanish tiles on the floors and banquettes under the mezzanine. A giant gold bull is centre focus at the staircase. There’s also a private dining room upstairs and a hubbly-bubbly lounge up-upstairs.

La Parada, which in Spanish means the stopping place, is the latest chain to make it to uMhlanga, with three or four restaurants in Cape Town and one in Johannesburg. It is part of the Harbour House Group that also owns Tiger’s Milk.

But food writer Ingrid Shevlin and I are not here for the decor. (She was critical of the lighting. I didn’t like the one wall of stained glass. It reminded me of Spur.) We’re here to try its Spanishinspired tapas.

The first thing one is struck by on the menu is a sushi selection. Tapas? Well, in the sense that it’s small plates and different flavour combinations, maybe, but certainly miles away from Spain. Sufficient to say if rainbow, California and maki rolls are your thing, they’ve got them, along with salmon bombs and ngiri. But we didn’t come here for sushi.

Mains, on the other hand, feel more like Italy than Spain, with a range of pastas that include mushroom, prawn, or chicken and broccoli. There’s also a beef risotto. And the one item no Durban menu is brave enough to leave out – the burger. Here it’s a crispy chicken or a wagyu beef version, complete with their own burger sauce.

There are steaks – fillet in 300g or 500g, and T-bone 600g or 1kg. The only main course to pique interest was the kingklip and palak chaat (crispy spinach) with tamarind and coriander yoghurt. Mussels in white wine with sauce verde at least talk to Spain.

When it comes to the tapas menu, peppadew poppers with basil aioli looked a little bit ho-hum, as did tuna tacos with pineapple slaw and guacamole. Our waiter sang the praises of the wagyu potstickers served with kimchi and a soy dipping sauce.

The kimchi was a deal breaker. More interesting were the prawn croquettes in a spicy tomato mayonnaise, and the beef fillet with tahini and honey yoghurt, walnut pesto, chilli butter and crispy leeks.

We started with the potato skins seasoned with truffle zest (R30). Now these, if they came straight out of the fryer on to the table, would have been exceptional, except they had cooled somewhat by the time they got to us and had lost some of their crisp. They were paired with grilled calamari with chimichurri, cucumber and tomato and roasted garlic aioli (R105), which was a pleasant dish, except again, the calamari had been standing.

Then there was the tuna ceviche with avocado mousse (R115), which wasn’t a ceviche at all. It was more like sashimi. Ceviche is a Peruvian dish popular along the Pacific coast of South America. It’s fresh raw fish cured in lime juice, sometimes lemon or bitter orange, and spiced with peppers or chilli, spring onions or onions, salt and coriander. It comes from the Quechuan word for tender fish. This just tasted like a slab of raw tuna. If only the green blobs had been wasabi.

For round two, we tried the duck croquettes with cranberry sauce and orange segments (R120) which we enjoyed and were the pick of the lunch offerings. A bikini toastie (R70) was a disappointment.

The original bikini sandwich has nothing to do with beautiful figures in skimpy costumes. It’s named after the late-night munchies served by street vendors outside Barcelona’s Bikini Concert Hall. These crisp ham and cheese sandwiches have since had the Hollywood treatment, and morphed into sandwiches with Serrano ham, Manchego cheese and truffle aioli. All ingredients that pack a flavour punch.

Our bikini looked both undertanned and under-filled. Half the joy of a toasty is the crisp bread and bubbly burnt cheese about the edges. This was positively anaemic. And the mozzarella added no flavour. It was left to swim in a pool of mayonnaise.

The pork rillettes with sweet mustard aioli and pickles (R105) fared no better. This French “spread” – it’s not a pâté – is made from slow-cooking meats in their own juices for hours until they fall apart and are intensely flavourful. It’s often a way of using all the trimmings of a variety of meats or preserving meats. This, however, was a pile of very dry pulled pork which tasted faintly of curry powder, again swimming in more mayonnaise.

Desserts are limited. There’s an olive oil sponge, which might be quite pleasant on its own, but it’s tarted up with all sorts of berry, strawberry and meringue treatments that make it sound more like an Eton mess.

Then there’s an orange and miso malva pudding. Now we’re both adventurous eaters, but neither of us fancied miso in our malva. Instead, we enjoyed the conventional churros (R65) with a chocolate ganache.

Finally, an apology. In a recent review of a number of restaurants along the Berea’s Problem Mkhize Road, I confused the name of one of the establishments. The cake shop where we had coffee and a crème brûlée is called The Cake Dealer. The Gourmet Station is part of the Junk Yard complex two doors down, and sells imported sweets and frozen meals.

I hope I will be forgiven: the Gourmet Station sign is at the entrance to The Cake Dealer, and the bill was just a no name brand till slip.

Food: 2½

Service: 3½

Ambience: 4

The bill: R707, with soft drinks.

METRO

en-za

2022-01-22T08:00:00.0000000Z

2022-01-22T08:00:00.0000000Z

http://independentonsaturday.pressreader.com/article/281685438222168

African News Agency