CocoáFair – the Biscuit Mill acquires a taste for chocolate

CocoáFair

There is a little more to CocoáFair than simply chocol­ate. For many of us just the prom­ise of loc­ally made, artisan, organic chocol­ate is enough of an invit­a­tion to have us reach­ing for a taste...and believe me, hav­ing sampled, it is a mouth-watering experience.

But Thor soon explains, as I query the name, that yes, CocoáFair is def­in­itely about the fair­ness involved in the way the cocoa is traded, but the emphasis is also very much on the 'affair' with cocoa – not only the love of it, but the rela­tion­ship of cocoa with the people who grow it, and the people who turn it into chocolate.

And an affair there most def­in­itely is. On dis­play on shelves to my right and left are bars of organic chocol­ate, pralines, truffles, a bar­rel filled with incred­ibly reas­on­ably priced raw cacoa, organic sugar, and sliv­ers of chocol­ate — bagged, and tied up with a rib­bon. Continued

The Old Biscuit Mill revisited

Old Biscuit Mill

The Old Biscuit Mill, in Albert Rd, Woodstock, was once a run down mill and an eye­sore. Courageous developers had a dar­ing vis­ion to cre­ate a unique space for cre­at­ives and design­ers who could work and show­case their cre­ations in the same space. The idea was to see people at work, to wit­ness the source of the cre­ations. The intro­duc­tion of the Neighbourgoods Market on a Saturday helped cata­pult the amount of vis­it­ors to the old Biscuit Mill on Saturdays, although many people began to think the entire build­ing only oper­ated on a Saturday. This is obvi­ously not the case – there are many incred­ible busi­nesses, cof­fee shops and res­taur­ants there that are world-class and deserve your atten­tion. Take the time to visit the Old Biscuit Mill Continued

GREAT Walk and MORE Exhibition in Woodstock, Cape Town

Arts Festival

Woodstock and more spe­cific­ally Greatmore Street will be going art mad on 25 and 26 June 2010 in Woodstock, Cape Town The GREAT Walk and MORE Exhibition intends to cre­ate a pos­it­ive image of the area while bring­ing con­tem­por­ary art into the community’s space. Expect to see a vari­ety of works which include art, art install­a­tions, sound install­a­tions, pro­jec­tions, live art per­form­ances and music and street performance.

The com­munity will be get­ting involved in this event by lend­ing their stoeps and shop fronts as exhib­i­tion space and indi­vidual gal­ler­ies. This will be an art gal­lery extra­vag­anza like none you have exper­i­enced before. The Greatmore Gallery’s space will fea­ture a cur­ated exhib­i­tion as well as works cre­ated through two work­shops hos­ted at the venue. Other artists and gal­ler­ies are encour­aged to exhibit their own works. Continued

Chandani in Woodstock

Chandani

We're fans of Indian food, and rather than head­ing off to town to eat at Bukhara's — which, incid­ent­ally, has recently had a fire (we learned as much when try­ing to book a table) where the plush décor is a pre-sentiment of the bill that fol­lows, even if the food is sup­posed to be indes­crib­ably good — we spot­ted Chandani's in Woodstock whilst leaf­ing through the Time-Out (rather obvi­ously, we don't get out much!).

The added bene­fit of book­ing a table at Chandani's was that their meat is all halaal and there are a lot of veget­arian options on the menu, since we were din­ing with someone who was fast­ing for Ramadan, who wouldn't have taken lightly to dis­cov­er­ing that his first meal of the day was going to be severely restric­ted because the kit­chen hadn't con­sidered his needs ... Continued

Neighbourgoods Market in Cape Town

Neighbourgoods Market

The Neighbourgoods Market based at 'The Old Biscuit Mill' in Woodstock, is Cape Town’s answer to world renowned mar­kets such as Portobello Market in the U.K. It has a ded­ic­ated fol­low­ing of fash­ionis­tas, fam­il­ies, chefs, sin­geltons, hip­pies, yup­pies and just about any other per­son who appre­ci­ates great food and atmo­sphere and some­thing truly unique to fill a Saturday morning.

A busy hub of organic offer­ings includ­ing meat, cheese, bever­ages, chocol­ates, cakes and desserts, it offers even the most dis­cern­ing pal­ate a treat for the senses. With barely enough space to breathe on a Saturday morn­ing, this thriv­ing mar­ket place was the brain child of a local art gal­lery owner and has blos­somed and flour­ished into one of Cape Town’s most won­der­ful attrac­tions. Artists and crafters who pledge solid­ar­ity to the hand­made and home craf­ted revival sweep­ing the world, also dis­play their wares and the mar­ket show­cases top emer­ging design­ers as well as organic and hand­made children's products. Continued