5 Best Restaurants in The Western Cape and Winelands, South Africa

Reserve well in advance for the buffet lunch here at one of the Cape's most beautiful and historic wineries. A wide selection of soups, quiches, and pâtés prefaces a bewildering array of cold and hot main dishes, including pickled fish, roasts, and imaginative salads; traditional Cape dishes are well prepared. End with an excellent sampling of South African cheeses and preserves or a quintessentially Cape dessert such as malva pudding. Unobtrusive, professional, but friendly service complements the bounty, priced at R260 a head.

When Topsi Venter, doyenne of the Cape culinary scene, decided to hang up her apron and retire, it seemed appropriate that one of her former students, Chris Hoffman, should take over her popular restaurant. Chris peeled his first potato while apprenticed to Topsi and then went on to work at other restaurants. He has carried on with Topsi's tradition of delicious no-fuss food in a town in love with fine dining and foodie fuss. The blackboard menu changes regularly, and the food is rustic and hearty. Look out for slow-roasted duck served with stir-fried couscous and a spicy apricot sauce, or mushroom, basil, chili, and lemon pasta. Malva pudding (a South African traditional baked sticky pudding) is an all-time favorite and served with a delicate crème anglaise. In this valley of wonderful wines it's great to be able to BYOB, but they also have a small wine menu.

La Borie Wine Estate is nestled in the Paarl valley, with Paarl rock as its backdrop. Harvest, the on-site restaurant, offers elegant, relaxed dining for the whole family. You know you're in luck when you go to a restaurant headed up by Matthew Gordon, a fine chef who knows the business inside out. Enjoy an eclectic mix of South African cuisine on the oak-shaded terrace. Ingredients are sourced locally or grown in the restaurant's own garden. Look for free-range organic lamb, mussels, and fresh line fish. The menu also features scrumptious vegetarian options such as grilled large black mushrooms with a parsley crust and brown herb butter. The wine list includes wines from La Borie's own cellars and from KWV Wine Estate. Harvest is the winner of a Klink Award for best restaurant on a wine farm and has been voted among the top-10 most child-friendly restaurants, with a fabulous kids' menu that manages to avoid the tedious and overprocessed options so many other restaurants dish up.

Chef-owner Marc Friederich is a foodie with an instinctive feel for what will work. And work his restaurant does: it's consistently full, consistently interesting, and always a pleasure to eat in. What to choose? There's a Lebanese mezze for starters made up of mouthwatering dips, dolmades, falafel, and warm pitas for scooping, or you could opt for Marc's fish soup with a dash of ouzo and aioli crostini. For entrées there's organic beef, paella, or free-range duck breast with a fruity salsa. Children are also well looked after—there's spaghetti with tomato sauce, a choice of burgers with fries, and vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce as part of the deal for a very reasonable R50. Marc also serves as sommelier, so the wine list is comprehensive and he can help you with food-and-wine pairings.

The busy road and the swaths of invasive nonnative trees that need to be chopped down give absolutely no indication of the gem that lies beyond the entrance to Vergenoegd wine farm. Pomegranate chef Mike Israel is known for his fresh, contemporary cuisine, but you'll be hard-pressed to concentrate on the menu—the views are fantastic and the historic manor house has been wonderfully restored. Luckily, the menu is dead simple. Mike has gone for the less-is-more approach and simply lists fish, lamb, game, poultry, and vegetarian. This gives him plenty of scope to play with the fresh ingredients he has available. You could start with the famous Pomegranate tomato tart or opt for the beetroot carpaccio starter with goat cheese. There are field mushrooms served with rosemary and Gorgonzola in a poppy-seed crepe. Mains come with Mike's classic, flavor-filled sauces. The wine list is clever and has an excellent selection of good wines divided into three price categories, the cheapest cheekily referred to as Bank Manager's Choice.