It's Good Food and Wine Show-time in Cape Town this weekend - if you're in the Mother City, be sure to get in on all the celebrity chef action! And as you may know our first digimag, Eat Out Best Of Seafood, is fresh from the oven. Get your free copy now and see if your favourite seafood spots are featured.
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The search is on for the best steakhouses in the country, with Eat Out Best Of Steakhouses! Sink your teeth into a good piece of meat this weekend, and then cast your vote! Here are some of our steakhouse suggestions: Durban: Havana Grill and Wine Bar Butcher Block Cape Town: Hussar Grill Headquarters Johannesburg: The Local Grill The Meat Company Pretoria: Hillside Tavern The Grill Club

On a rainy night earlier this week I was snugly surrounded by chefs, students, food critics and restaurant patrons at The Barnyard Theatre. This time we weren’t together for a chef’s table, but to pay tribute to food doyenne Topsi Venter. She’s touched so many of our lives, whether through her huge personality, her wonderful food or her cookbooks. We had gathered to help raise funds for her much-needed hip replacement.

Topsi hosted one of the first cookery demonstrations I ever attended, and I still remember the sticky oxtail that she made with copious amounts of port. She cooked with such gusto and flamboyance that the memory has stuck.

At Monday’s tribute evening we ate picnic-style, enjoying the opening of surprise packets and tubs of steak salad, snoek pâté, poached quince cheesecake and the most divine bag of homemade marshmallows.

But Topsi wasn’t cooking; this was her night to relish memories and stories from her dear friends Nataniël, Danielle Pascal and Rocco de Villiers. We ate, we auctioned, we mingled and we laughed. Topsi said it was magical, and it was truly one of the best chef’s tables I’ve been to in a long time.

By the time we left, the rain had stopped and I couldn’t help feeling both sentimental and inspired by all that Topsi has contributed to the food industry. Our thoughts are with you, Topsi. 

Happy eating

Abigail
Eat Out Editor