Tag Archives: best burgers

An African Odyssey: Dog’s Bollocks and Bitch’s Tits

. Drinking, Eating . , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I had recently arrived from America and was tasked with interviewing some UK customers by my employer.  One such customer accused the company of being arrogant.  Leaning forward, he angrily stuck a finger in my face and asked, “why do you guys think that you are the dog’s bollocks”? I had no idea.  In fact I had no idea what “dog’s bollocks” meant.  I remember carefully writing down the words “dog’s bollocks” in my notebook and promising the customer that I will get back to him on the bollocks issue…

Dog’s bollocks means dog’s testicles, but in British slang usage it means very good, or the top of the pile.  Really.  Think bee’s knees or cat’s pyjamas. On the other hand when the word bollocks is used by itself, it means rubbish.  Or nuts.

A Lotus Eclat guards the entrance to Dog’s Bollocks

Dog’s can famously lick their own testicles.  Through the ages men have been fascinated and/or jealous of this canine capability.  I never did get around to getting Nigel Wood’s personal perspective on testicles as we chatted inside his restaurant, The Dog’s Bollocks in Cape Town, South Africa.  This is currently the hottest ticket in Cape Town, a burger restaurant in a garage/drive way.  The October 2012 UK edition of Esquire magazine lists it as one of the top ten attractions in Cape Town. They take no reservations and open from “5 to 50″.  Nigel starts serving at 5PM and stops when he’s served 50 burgers. After that he pushes the tables back to make room in the garage for his one-eyed 1970′s Lotus Eclat.  (The Eclat has a vacuum seal that keeps the pop-up headlamps shut.  If the car is left parked for a while, the vacuum leaks and one headlight pops open. Cute.)

The entrance to the restaurant is literally the garage door.  The tin roof has a few translucent plastic panels to let in light.  The long narrow space is broken up by a grill where the famous burgers are cooked.  Tucked away to a side is a branch of Deluxe Coffee Works, the artisanal coffee roasters in Cape Town.  A tiny motorbike repair shop also shares the space.  Customers of the coffee shop regularly ride their scooters and motorbikes into the store.  Its all uber trendy and slightly nuts.

Bikes and coffee next door at Deluxe Coffee Works

The garage roof leaks when it rains.  It was raining hard when I visited with Capetonian friends including the Cupcake (she’s sweet and she bakes well) and the Princess Monkey (she’s titled and she’s nuts).  The sloping garage floor was soon awash with rain water.  Nigel kindly showed us to a “good table” where we’d get less wet.  A waitress hurriedly unplugged a floor lamp.  Eventually someone donned galoshes and splashed across to fire up the grill.  The restaurant is BYOB except for wine.  Nigel bottles his own red and white in tubes and sells them under the U-Tube label (by Ukuva iAfrica).  It’s big in Poland, apparently. At Dog’s Bollocks the wine is served in conventional bottles at R55 (GB£4 or US$6 ).  I ordered a bottle of red.  Nigel gave me a bottle and said “here’s the wine, there are some glasses, here’s a corkscrew.”   The service is delightfully quirky, as is everything else about the place.   The restaurant serves different menus through the day – and is called different names at different times.  At breakfast the restaurant is called Mucky Mary’s Hubcap.  At lunch time it’s called The Bitch’s Tits.  Hubcaps, tits and testicles –  only in Africa!

Nigel preps his burgers

The burgers are amazing.  They are served on enormous, light as air rolls with what must be half a head of lettuce, onions, tomato and pickle.  The secret is in the home made sauces.  Mexican chocolate mole, pepperberry and blue cheese, and prego (a spicy Portuguese sauce) are standouts.  The table went quiet as we greedily tucked in.  I had the prego sauce and felt the spice gradually build up on my taste buds as beads of sweat broke out on my forehead.  The burgers are so large that once you man-handle them into your mouth you don’t want the hassle of putting them back down and figuring out how to pick them up again.  We inhaled our food.

Dog’s Bollocks is a symbol of how South Africa would like to see itself; multicultural, irreverent and re-inventing itself as it goes along.  Yet roofs and more leak all over the country.  I can’t tell whether we are seeing the birthing pains of a great African state or witnessing the last days of empire.  Either way it’s a fascinating place to visit.  Go! It’s the dog’s bollocks.

Further Reading and Drinking

The hot cocktail bar of the moment in Cape Town is The Orphanage.  An unfortunate choice of name perhaps but it is on Orphan Street and a share of profits do go to the orphanage up the road.  My favourite place for a post prandial drink however, is the bar at the Mount Nelson hotel where old world colonial glamour meets some of the most hospitable bar staff I’ve met.  The Old Fashioned’s and the Hendrick’s Cucumber Martinis they make are particularly good.

Blogger My Love Affair with Cape Town wishes to keep Dog’s Bollocks a secret so it wouldn’t get too crowded.  A common lament.  Sheila Allen talks about her love affair with burgers in Cape Town Alive.

Surf ‘n Turf, Damien Hirst and Winston Churchill’s mother

. Drinking, Eating . , , , , , , ,

Successful artists tend to be those we associate with a unique style or trend. Rich artists are those who distill their style to a few key elements and exploit it ruthlessly.   An ongoing exhibition of Damien Hirst at the Gagosian’s eleven galleries around the world underscores my point.  Entitled “25 Years of Spot Paintings” it celebrates the fact that Hirst has made millions selling paintings of coloured circles on white backgrounds. The emperor’s new clothes came to mind as I wandered through the Gagosian in Mayfair and tried to understand why anyone would spend tens of thousands to buy a painting of a spot.  There are even paintings of half a spot.  To be fair to Hirst he has a second trick.  He is really good at sawing animals in half and dipping them in formaldehyde. I imagine a factory somewhere in Shenzhen full of skilled  8 year olds churning out spot paintings and slicing animals in half…

One spot, two spot, half spot, full spot

Around the corner from the Gagosian in Mayfair is another factory with a couple of smart tricks up its sleeve. The Burger & Lobster restaurant and cocktail bar does what its name implies.  It serves burgers and lobster together with a fine selection of cocktails. There is no printed food menu. For your £20 (US $30) you have a choice of a burger or a lobster (flown in from Nova Scotia). Both dishes come with double cooked french fries and salad.  The food is good, but £20 is a lot for a burger. By comparison Daniel Boulud’s brasserie at the Mandarin Oriental which serves the best burgers in London according to my American friends, charges “only” £13.  Unlike in America however, whole lobster is considered a rare luxury in London and £20 is a fair price for a large crustacean with fries. The punters love the Burger and Lobster; it has been packed since it opened a few months ago.

I lunched there recently with friends including the Springbok Sloane. She belongs to a species who believe that leaving the bubble around Sloane Square is physically dangerous.  They occasionally drive to Mayfair in a Range Rover to eat at the Wolseley.  They are only tempted to leave the bubble by a hot new restaurant or a gallery opening.  The B&L buzz had reached Sloane Square and the Springbok Sloane was bang on trend.

The Burger and Lobster is also on trend with the annoying habit of not taking reservations. I don’t get the point of queuing for your food, but this is England where people like queues.  You must either get there early and shiver in the cold outside or jostle at the bar while covetously eyeing a table of diners lingering over their coffee.

The bar at the Burger and Lobster. The decor is simple but well executed

The atmosphere at the Burger & Lobster is casual and fun.  The decor is straightforward – stripped wood and exposed brick walls, stools and banquettes covered in red leather, the occasional marginally risqué piece of art.  The wait staff is uniformly cheerful.  Giles Looker of the Soul Shakers bar consultancy (Whisky Mist, Trailer Happiness, Virgin Airlines) has devised a cocktail list divided into B cocktails and L cocktails to go with your food.  There is a sensibly priced wine list but why drink grape when you can have cocktails matched to your food? All cocktails are priced at £9 (around US $12).  The B cocktails feature a whisky or bourbon base to go with your beef. The Bull and Bear for example had a base of Woodford Reserve bourbon with blackberries, raspberries and mure (a blackberry liquor) topped with Zinfandel.  The L cocktails are lighter with primarily a gin or vodka base.  I had a B&L gin fizz which on a base of Beefeater gin had Cointreau, lemon, egg cream (for body), rhubarb bitters and soda.  It was the perfect accompaniment to lobster – creamy but not sweet with a nice hint of bitters coming through on the palate. On paper, a lot of modern cocktails appear to have too many fussy ingredients.  Skillfully blended, as they are at the B&L they are light, complex and tasty.  I would have happily stayed to work my way through more of the cocktail list, but the throng at the bar eyeing up your table discourages tarrying.  They turn their tables quickly here.  At heart the Burger & Lobster is a premium fast food restaurant.

In need of a post prandial tipple we turned the corner into the casual elegance and warmth of the Connaught Hotel.  The hotel has two bars. I usually go to the Connaught Bar, covered in a previous blog under the Finest Hotel Bars in London. However it doesn’t open till 4pm, so we went to the Coburg Bar instead.  This is a traditional hotel bar, which stays open all day and serves light meals and drinks. At the Connaught they do this kind of bar with style and elegance.  The cocktail menu at the Coburg Bar has a chronological bent to it with eight pages of drinks ordered by their date of origin.  The list starts with a pre-1800 drink; the sour family of cocktails. You choose a spirit and they’ll add sugar, lemon juice and egg white to make your sour.  Take a look at their bacchonology menu if you have a moment to spare – it’s a fun read!

I learned that the Pimm’s Cup No 1 was the first British Cocktail, invented by James Pimm for his London oyster bar, circa 1840.  Flips, cobblers, fizz’s and daiquiris originated from the 19th century.  Margaritas, martinis, piña coladas and Bloody Mary’s hailed from the 20th century.  I chose a Manhattan figuring the rye whisky and bitters  (with a dash of vermouth) would cut through the richness of my meal.  The Manhattan was invented in the 1870s at the Manhattan Club in New York  for a banquet thrown by Jennie Churchill (mother of Winston).  I enjoyed the history lesson and I enjoyed the Coburg.  It is not a destination bar but is a warm and convivial place to relax with friends. It is not cheap, but having apparently “saved” money eating cheap lobster, we minded less…