kwaLapa – telling the stories of food

kwaLapa in Newlands

It's my week for vis­it­ing food stores. And kwaLapa in Newlands Montebello Design Centre, just recently opened, is about to take the south­ern sub­urbs organic-and-green-for-lunch crowd by storm.

It's not just their catchy byline — telling the stor­ies of food, where the store weaves the stor­ies of its sup­pli­ers into the very fab­ric of the walls — but it is also the menu, filled with organic, whole­some options that include but­ter­milk flap­jacks, raw muesli, organic soup of the day, delect­ably filled wraps, a freshly tossed salad of the day served with a cran­berry or blue­berry dip, and vari­ous organic cof­fee and tea options that make one fairly burst to sit and sip, whilst wav­ing one's hands in the air for them to 'bring it on'! ...

Not since Organic Living in Plumstead closed its res­taur­ant doors and absconded to Constantia Village (where it remains a thriv­ing organic health store), has a deli held so much prom­ise. And when you see their venue, you will under­stand. KwaLapa is set in amongst the trees, sheltered beneath a bedouin tent, its cent­ral ful­crum a huge, old tree that lends the space an incred­ible feel­ing, with wooden, tem­por­ary walls at vari­ous heights that both keep the weather at bay, and allow in the won­der­ful nat­ural sur­rounds at Montebello.

By Right Mukore

Fey light fit­tings designed by Street Wires cas­cade from the roof, there are hand­craf­ted tables from recycled mater­i­als at which to sit, made by Weyers Marais, and the long cent­ral table found in the shop proper (the part of the shop that is inside, as opposed to out­side), as well as two other, were hand­craf­ted by local Montebello artist Right Mukore (you can visit his stu­dio dir­ectly across from kwaLapa). See his web­site at http://www.mukore.com/

KwaLapa have been very quiet about its open­ing. They're post­pon­ing their offi­cial launch until November, in time for sum­mer, which also allows them to get through the ini­tial teeth­ing prob­lems that appar­ently beset all such ven­tures. But it's dif­fi­cult to see any sign of these.

It's true that the store is not teem­ing with products — I'd be wor­ried if it was as there is a derth of truly cer­ti­fied organic, local products. What they have on their shelves are care­fully hand­picked products that reflect the ethos of the store and local com­munity pro­jects, like Beanthere cof­fee, an Ethiopian, Fairtrade, single estate cof­fee, truly free-range eggs hand­picked at Splash farm, milk, feta, rusks and jam from Camphill Village, and some gor­geous dried flower arrange­ments in bas­kets that urge on to indulge.

Beenthere Coffee

And speak­ing of indul­gences, after Emily, one of the four part­ners involved in kwaLapa, has fin­ished show­ing me around and point­ing out the finer points of many of the products, it is dif­fi­cult for me to res­ist whip­ping out my debit card as a 'shop­ping spree in the mak­ing' hits me from a dizzy height. I'm here, after all, to scout the place out for a write up, not to sati­ate my desires. But go on, a cup of your wild hot chocol­ate, made from organic cocoa, wild honey and spices (no sugar) would def­in­itely tempt me!

And so I sit and listen to the vari­ous stor­ies behind the food. There's Sky, the young farmer with a farm in Philipi who sup­plies their fresh organic pro­duce on a weekly basis. They're wait­ing on a deliv­ery from him as we sit and chat, and moments later he arrives, den­ims tucked into wel­lies — a par­ody of the Constantia horsy crowd who parade in their jod­purs and boots. I hear about the already men­tioned tables, their eggs and dairy, their organic saus­ages (to which I suc­cumbed) and their plans for the future.

Biophile Magazine

There are the fine pot­tery tea cups and sau­cers, loc­ally designed and made, and even a ref­er­ence sec­tion in the shop where you can sit and read back­dated ver­sions of local green magazines like Biophile and Shared Earth, and local books like Bending the Curve and the Beryn and Peter Daniel's latest raw food (un)cook book.

There is a gen­eral light­ness about the store that is hard to describe, and has a lot to do with the obvi­ous pas­sion that the 4 part­ners involved, Emily, Patrick, Bruce and Paula, have poured into the store. If food could speak, what would it say to us? Would it tell us about its friends? Who's cared for it, car­ried it around, the things it saw along the way, the places it vis­ited, the people who raised it, its ancest­ory and its dreams?

Find Kwalapa:
31 Newlands Avenue, Newlands, Cape Town
Telephone +27 (0)21 687‑9314
Website: http://www.kwalapa.co.za

Useful Links:
For lots of ideas for places to go see our sec­tion on Things to Do in Cape Town. The sec­tion includes Art Galleries, craft and flea mar­kets, farm­ers mar­kets, cafes and eat­er­ies, places to shop ... and a whole lot more! And if you are a tour­ist see Cape Town Attractions for all the recom­men­ded things to see and Cape Town Hotels to plan your trip!