When the nights are closing in and the weather’s nippy, long lunches and fireside dinners with friends are on the menu – preferably laden with real slow-cooked food. Delis and farmstalls are the new way to stock your shelves with food fit to share with friends, and worth the detour. Many of them stock locally supplied and home-made goodies that not only look beautiful, but also taste good.
They’re the budget equivalent of eating out, and in, as delis and markets supply nosh that is as easy to use for picnics as it is to translate into plate-filled fare at home. And perfect for the typical Johannesburg weekend rush – it’s slow-food without having to actually do it yourself. Choose from any number in your area, and enjoy the highveld sun-filled days and freezing evenings.
Adriatic Ship Supply and Trading Company
Its food, like its name, is more than a bit of a mouthful. No, the Adriatic Ship Supply and Trading Company does not specialise in shipping containers but it does import some of the most mouth-watering Italian food and specialist catering equipment.
This is where you’ll find incredible coffees, olive oil, balsamic vinegar and Italian pastas. But you’ll also find a mouth-watering array of Italian cheeses, cold meats, canned artichokes and bottled pepperoni. They also sell catering equipment and you can order everything they have online, should a trip to their deli prove difficult.
Newton Street, Meadowdale ext. 3, Germiston
Telephone +27 (0)11 39248096
Alexanders
Best known for their kosher food and breakfasts, Alexanders produces a hot beef on rye that will have you salivating on entering the door. Their build-your-own bagels will find you at a table faster than you can say ‘breakfast anyone?’, and the smells of the baked every morning breads, pastries and pies will stop you in your tracks.
That’s before you’ve sampled their freshly prepared vegetable dishes and meat products. Pick up a chicken soup that gives ‘home-made’ new meaning, katkes, chopped herring and liver, gefilte fish, teiglach drowned in honey, any number of spreads like humus and pickled brinjal, and an array of salads.
48 The Avenue, Norwood, Sandton
Telephone +27 (0)11 728 5901
A Portas
The deli that’s also a train shop, A Portas is also known as The Shunting Yard. The shop, originally in Rosebank, was there since the year dot (1896 to be precise), opened by George Lagoudis’ great uncle. When George, the train fanatic, took over, he extended the shop to include shelves of model trains, hence two names for one shop.
The deli is a great novelty (where else in the world can you sip coffee and discuss trains at the same time, other than at a train station?) and visited by train enthusiasts country-wide. You’ll also find some wonderful Italian and Greek delicacies – the cheese, olives, cold meats, filo pastry and coffee are first rate.
Sunninghill village Shopping Centre, Edison Crescent, cnr Maxwell Drive, Sunninghill
Telephone +27 (0)11 234 9933
Bryanston Food Market
Great little market (not to be confused with the Bryanston Organic Market at the Waldorf school), open all week, that supports local and stocks a great fruit and veg section, a meat outlet, a small fresh fish counter and a frozen section for seafood together with a confectionary section and other health food and jams, home-made cakes and pastries.
Cramerview Village Centre, 277 Main Road, Bryanston
Telephone +27 (0)11 706 2914
Cheese Gourmet
These guys won Eat In 2010 Best Deli trophy, which should give you an idea of what to expect – cheese from over 140 different local boutique cheese farmers, pickles, meats – like home-cured bacon and sausages -, bottled items, olives, oils and tapenades.
There are also an array of quality breads, crackers, and biscuits. You can also sample first, so that you leave one very satisfied customer. Eat out at Cheese Gourmet where you can share a Ploughman’s platter with pork pies, or a breakfast that includes the locally cured bacon and sausages. Hmmmm
71 Seventh Street, corner 3rd Avenue, Linden
Telephone +27 (0)11 888 5384
Deli Bellagio
The focus at Bellagio restaurant is essentially on fish, but in an Italian way, so you’ll find seafood, but also things like pasta and risotto. Just next door is their deli and fish shop. Whilst they will complain about the shortage of fish here in the hinterland, far from the sea, you can bank on some wonderful sushi, fishcakes or oysters.
And their takeaway fish and chips is worth writing home about.
Bluebird Shopping Centre, cnr of Athol Oaklands and Fort Street, Birnam
Telephone +27 (0)11 885 3938
Elbows Up Deli
Great food experience where you can bank on finding real farm and home industry products from around the country. As they say on their website:”We relish saucing unique products which create the ultimate taste experience.”
Their thyme bomb salad dressing and high five combo are worth the visit alone, and coupled with the Lifestyle Garden Centre, where you’ll find them tucked away behind the Silverbirch Restaurant, this is an outing that leads to indulgence. You’ll also find them at various food markets across Gauteng.
Gourmet Market, Lifestyle Garden Centre, cnr Beyers Naude Drive and Ysterhout, Randpark Ridge
Telephone +27 (0)82 561 6060
Fama Delicatessen
This is where you head for your meat and sausage requirements, for Roberto Sa Gimenez is a Spanish salumiere or sausage artisan, slow food movement passionata and renowned for his cured hams, salami, coppa, chorizo, lonza and pancetta. He’s the guy who supplies local restaurants.
A few slices of his meats, or sausages, on a platter, served with cheese and homemade breads, and you have fare fit for any weekend lunch. It might be located right in the inner-city, with scrap metal merchants as neighbours, but you’ll want to see his Serrano-style hams personally – they hang for between 12 and 18 months (no additives, no chemicals).
12 Viljoen Street, Lorentzville, Bertrams
Telephone +27 (0)11 618 3048
Market Place Natural Foods Deli
The Market Place Natural Foods Deli is a popular deli selling mouth-watering meals, snacks and take-aways, as well as some incredible ice creams, all without preservatives or nasties that are said to be rather delicious.
Grafton Avenue, Craighall Park, Johannesburg
Telephone +27 (0)11 447 4436
O’Crumbs Bakery and Deli
Famous for its gluten-free and wheat-free baked goods, and a wonderful range of speciality breads. Also find lactose-free, sugar-free bread, muffins, pasta etc. baked by Allan and Val Stricke, originally from Cape Town.
Fishershill, Main Road
Telephone +27 (0)81 329 6307
Thrupps
Where would we be without Thrupps? It’s Jo’burg’s equivalent to Harrods you can get just about anything here in the form of food, both local and imported, including free-range chicken, quail or goose, incredible seafood, a bakery, fresh fruit and veg, and the Health Emporium stocks organic.
They also do a calling order service, hold standing orders and allow you to order online (although their system is not particularly user-friendly, but perhaps that will change). They do prepared hampers, and if you search, you will find affordable options in amongst the top-end produce.
Thrupps Illovo Centre, cnr Oxford and Rudd Roads, Illovo
Telephone +27 (0)11 268 0298
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