Kloof Street introduces another culinary contender
Cape Town’s culinary climate can, at times, play out like a Hunger Games of sorts. Distinguished chefs are often called upon to establish their own eateries while dedicated gourmands nominate themselves to pay tribute to food in any manner they deem appropriate.
Only the strongest survive.
Deep within the walls of the Mother City lie the ghosts of failed restaurants. One that has managed to survive the cut throat gestating period of fleeting trends is Unfiltered. Open for exactly nine months, this inner city haunt is proving to be a tough contender on the famed Kloof Street.
It’s a typically tropical spring afternoon when I weave through traffic and enter Unfiltered. While the excitement of the impending rugby final between South Africa and England is palpable, all the nervous energy melts away as soon as I take my seat on the veranda. Tom Misch is pouring from the speakers inside. Around me, a few hipsters are drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes and engaging in dogmatic discourse.
James whips onto the floor, laptop in hand.
“We really just want to be a place people can come to relax and unwind with some good food and great beer,” the young brewer and restaurateur smiles. Having established Rosebank Brewing Company in 2016, after wetting his feet through a triumph of various waitron jobs, James felt it was time to open his own place.
The atmosphere he intended has been well achieved. All the staff are cool and casual with diners, exuding a certain familiarity I assume has been built over repeated interactions. Unfiltered is still relatively new and already has regulars.
It’s clear that the Unfiltered team is a greater sum of its parts – true salt of the earth people, which is a great characteristic for a restaurant to have.
As James takes me through the adjustments his passion project has experienced since its opening, I come to truly appreciate the name. Here is this enthusiastic guy, speaking candidly about the restaurant business. Some would argue that it looks glamorous from the outside. The perspective is certainly different as a budding food fundi trying to make it. The microbrewer has rolled with the punches, taken everything on the chin and his agility has proven his best weapon in surviving the culling so many other restaurants experience.
Unfiltered has refined their menu. The initial offering was exhaustive but James felt it necessary to exchange being a Jack of all trades – so to speak – and become a master of some, instead. “Now I am confident that whatever comes out that kitchen is something I and all of us (Unfiltered staff) can be proud of,” James shares. You have seven items to choose from, barring the seven pizzas they have available too, and anything you order will display a true command of flavor and premium ingredients.
I’m sure many of you are well aware that I am a stubborn creature of habit. I only get my slices from one pizza joint in Cape Town. It happens to be on Kloof Street too, not far from Unfiltered. As I order the margherita, I feel like I am betraying the hole-in-the-wall pizzeria I have patronized for years but James has only had glowing things to say about the Neapolitan-style pizza one of his chefs, Ben, makes. “On any other pizza, you might be able to hide bad flavours under a mountain of toppings; you can’t with a margherita. If the tomato base is off, you’ll be able to tell immediately,” James insists. It’s like he’s read my mind. Cherry tomatoes, basil and mozzarella is already my favorite flavour trio. The fact that a brilliant Italian thought to marry them with an edible plate is genius. Meeting a restaurant owner who understands that you cannot say you make good pizza if you can’t manage to perfect something as basic as a margherita is enough to convince me to commit this act of infidelity.
The pizza arrives and it is a salacious experience from the first slice. I want to inhale the pizza greedily. With the first half, I do. Now, I want to savour the perfect balance of flavours and textures. The base is wafer thin but manages to support the toppings with ease. I tear the crust open and try the pizza dough by itself. The elasticity is what has given the base the strength to shoulder the toppings, proof that the dough has been proven for the perfect amount of time. It has been seasoned well. The tomato sauce is tangy, with a sweetness that complements the saltiness of the crust that is bitter in some places because of the charring. Cheese should be added to pizza modestly; otherwise it becomes thick and sickly with a film of oil secretion. Ben decorated the pizza with disks mozzarella like a well-intended Jackson Pollock. Lest we forget the basil garnish. What’s not to love about the complex herb; sweet when raw, sharp when left under the heat. The pizza has a healthy balance of both.
By the forth slice, I am full. My taste buds want to power through the last two slices but I manage to tame them. I pop my head in from the veranda to bid James farewell. More of a see you later because I plan to convince my friends to come watch the World Cup final here. They have a bottomless gin and tonic special running, and it’ll be a great place to watch our boys in green and gold bring the trophy home.
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We all know how the final went, and what fun we had at Unfiltered on Saturday. Be sure to book a table for their G&T special. R190pp to drink until you drop.
Three weeks until summer officially starts, but the weather is getting pretty festive already, so I’m rolling out reviews of some of my favourite restaurants to check out this season. You’ll wanna hear all about the cannabis sushi I had at Blowfish Restaurant. I was at Belly of the Beast today and I’ll need to pick my jaw up off the floor before giving you all the delicious details.
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