De Volkskombuis in Stellenbosch — a review

De Volkskombuis

“De Volkskombuis? I can’t even pro­nounce that!” was my reac­tion when I heard where we were going for din­ner. Forgive me, I grew up abroad and my Afrikaans is lim­ited to “Dankie”. So on Tuesday night I found myself at De Volkskombuis Restaurant in Stellenbosch. Four food­ies and a couple of racing enthu­si­asts meant that our con­ver­sa­tion whip­lashed between track times and what we had been cook­ing. We were all look­ing for­ward to our din­ner immensely. I dis­covered that De Volkskombuis is a fine din­ing estab­lish­ment which spe­cial­izes in Cape Dutch cuisine, and was look­ing for­ward to some of my tra­di­tional favorites.

We sat down at our corner table and enjoyed a good bottle of Neethlingshof caber­net sauvignon-merlot, a rich deep plumy red. De Volkskombuis has an extens­ive fine wine list that is a good reflec­tion of the region. It is divided into the dif­fer­ent cul­tivars and also offers other fant­astic South African wines ran­ging in price from R70 to R410, or French cham­pagne at R900 a bottle.

We then set about decid­ing what to order for starters, which proved to be a dif­fi­cult choice. I opened the menu and it was in Afrikaans. Houston we have a prob­lem! Then I dis­covered that if you open the menu to the middle its in English. Phew. We were faced with a choice of the Africa salad — a deli­cious biltong salad, snoek sam­oo­sas, ostrich carpac­cio, and veget­arian puff pastry tarts, potato gnoc­chi or a quail ter­rine, which ranged in price from R45 –R65.

Some of the group decided that they would share starters and also have dessert. The starters came and out popped the cam­eras as the food­ies all rushed to pho­to­graph the food — flash, flash. Then, as we were all dying of anti­cip­a­tion we dived in. The potato gnoc­chi was deli­cious and came coated in a del­ic­ate blue cheese sauce, topped with shav­ings of biltong. One of the most inter­est­ing starters was the decon­struc­ted veget­arian tart which had a mound of salad and a deli­cious bal­samic dress­ing. The only cri­ti­cism my friend Bev had was that she thought that the pastry was a bit tough for her lik­ing. The prawns were declared deli­cious and the soup of the day, which was but­ter­nut, was great, just the right amount for a starter.

For mains I was torn, should I have Meraai’s chicken pie, which has been a favor­ite for over 37 years, or have the oxtail. I am a sucker for oxtail and can sel­dom res­ist it, so that is what I ended up order­ing. Two of us decided to have the chicken pie, two of us had oxtail, Eric had the rack of lamb, and Bev had the fish of the day. The mains ranged in price from R50 – R130.

The oxtail came in a little potjie that was delivered to the table. The oxtail was melt­ingly tender from a long slow braise in the oven, and had a rich sauce that was slightly sweet and fruity. It was served with mashed pota­toes which were topped with deli­cious car­a­mel­ized onions. Bev’s fish of the day, which was sole, was impec­cably cooked and res­ted on a simple risotto. The rack of lamb was per­fectly pink in the middle and Merrai’s chicken pie was packed with fla­vor­some chicken which Dave declared deserved its nearly forty year old reputation.

After a short pause, where another bottle of wine was briefly con­sidered, we decided to have dessert. I was temp­ted, out of pure greed­i­ness, to try the Cape Country dessert plat­ter which was a sampler plate that included tastes of tra­di­tional Cape Dutch treats. I gave in totempta­tion and when it arrived I was not dis­ap­poin­ted. On the plat­ter was a divine Amarula mousse, warm rich mouth­ful of Cape Brandy pud­ding, a sliver of milk tart and the smal­lest koek­s­ister I have ever seen. Lara had a deli­cious Triffle that was made with sherry cus­tard, fresh rasp­ber­ries and sponge. Dave and Tandy shred the crème bru­lee, which they said was deli­cious but a tad on the heavy side. There was also the option of a cheese board for those who would prefer.  Desserts ranged in price from R40 – R60.

Of course great com­pany makes for a great meal, but all in all we found the ser­vice smooth and unob­trus­ive. We agreed that it had been a delight­ful even­ing and the res­taur­ant has all the warm hos­pit­al­ity that for­eign­ers can expect in the Western Cape. This is a great res­taur­ant for people vis­it­ing the Cape to sample tra­di­tional fare in a fine din­ing establishment.

Address & Contact Details:

De Volkskombuis is situ­ated on Aan de Wagen Road, Stellenbosch.
They can be con­tac­ted on +27 (0) 21 887‑2121 or +27 (0)21 887‑5239

Stellenbosch Links:

Stellenbosch Hotels
Stellenbosch Accommodation
Cape Winelands Accommodation
Western Cape Accommodation