And to go with all this lovely wine? Delicious food! Without exception, guests at The Coachman Guest House rave about South African cuisine, its variety, its excellence and its price. With its rich multi-cultural heritage, bountiful crops and varied climates, as well as oceans teeming with fish, dishes range from traditional, through modern South African to cosmopolitan. Something here for everyone’s taste!

Cape Town – rather like New York – boasts many trendy restaurants, while smaller centres such as Franschhoek have an enviable reputation for good food. (See Roussouw’s Restaurants 2004 www.portfoliocollection.com).

However we say Eat your Heart out to them – Swellendam for its size has several top class restaurants. We particularly like The Old Gaol – sophisticated, eclectic, well balanced haute cuisine; Roosje van de Kaap well established cosy, candlelit bistro renowned for its fillets and traditional Cape Malay dishes; The Connection, friendly, family restaurant serving fresh food, freshly cooked ; Koornlands cosmopolitan and game dishes beautifully presented; de Vagabond a la carte menu serving Belgian and traditional specialities.

Book shops offer a wide selection of cookery books so you can reproduce some of the dishes you’ve enjoyed in South Africa. Carmen Niehaus’s “Let’s Cook 4” (ISBN 0 7981 4073 9 Human and Rousseau 2001) is a gorgeous gourmet tour in words and pictures. As a matter of interest the cover features the Drostdy Museum’s Old Gaol Complex in Swellendam.