Thursday, 8 October, 2015
Veritas Awards
To celebrate a quarter of a century, guests will be treated to a mouth-watering four-course menu carefully crafted by celebrity chefs Bertus Basson and David Higgs, and the CTICC’s Executive Chef, Warwick Thomas. The dinner will be accompanied by a selection of recent Veritas gold and double gold winning wines, as well as an array of brandies and Qualité award winning cheeses.
The menu kicks off with a Higgs creation: orange-cured trout accompanied by sunflower seed pesto and a salad of sunflower shoots, pickled cucumber, radish and salted almonds. Main course is courtesy of Warwick Thomas, who will prepare seared lamb loin with slow-roasted shoulder, pumpkin risotto with bone marrow, and a sugar-snap pea and tomato salsa. Aptly named, dessert is Basson’s innovation dubbed Pudding at my Mother’s Table incorporating a fridge tart and his Mother’s apple pie recipe, lovingly served with jelly and custard and ice cream.
Basson rose to fame through establishing Overture Restaurant in Stellenbosch as one of the finest restaurants in South Africa, featuring in the coveted Eat Out Top 10 for six years running. He is highly regarded for his commitment to using fresh, local ingredients and his skill in perfecting the detail of every dish. Basson is now a household name through his television status following Ultimate Braai Master, currently in its fourth season.
Higgs was awarded SA Chef of the Year by Eat Out Magazine in 2011 and became Executive Chef in 2012 at the revered Saxon Hotel in Johannesburg’s glitzy Sandhurst mecca. His prior experience saw him co-establishing a fine dining restaurant alongside Jean Engelbrecht at the historical Rust en Vrede wine farm, as well as having cooked on numerous occasions for Nelson Mandela. For three years, he worked at the acclaimed Meerendal estate where he not only institued their fine dining restaurant, but also ran his own cooking school on the premises.
Both chefs have won numerous awards over the years.
For more information about the Veritas Awards, visit www.veritas.co.za or follow Veritas on social media by liking their Facebook page and following them on Twitter. Add them to your circles on Google+. Join the conversation using #Veritas25.