Village Explorer
14 March 2017
17
La Pentola – just because it’s lekker Hedda Mittner
F
amily, friends and fusion cuisine are the things that float Shane Sauvage’s boat. Add to that his love of the ocean and you have the main ingredients of this celebrity chef’s latest award-winning cookbook, Cape Fusion. It is the third book in a trilogy that started with The Edge of Fusion and was followed by In Fusion – and there is already a fourth book in the pipeline. Next month Shane will be celebrating the fifth birthday of La Pentola Hermanus, his popular restaurant on Marine Drive overlooking Walker Bay. The name literally means “saucepan” in Italian and comes from Shane’s critically acclaimed La Pentola restaurant in Pretoria, which he’d founded and run for more than 20 years before making the lifechanging decision to move to the Cape. For chef Shane, having a restaurant at the sea is the culmination of a dream and a privilege he enjoys and appreciates with typical passion and exuberance. “I wish I’d done it years earlier,” he says. “While still living in Pretoria we often came to Hermanus on holiday and we just loved the beach, the whales and sharks, and the relaxed lifestyle.” In the end, it was a close encounter with a Great White Shark that provided the impetus. In Cape Fusion, which is so much more than a cookbook and incorporates personal experiences and photographs of his life’s journey, Shane describes how he’d always been fascinated by (and petrified of!) sharks. “It was the most incredible experience of a lifetime” is how he relates his first shark cage diving trip with marine biologist Alison Towner of Marine Dynamics in Gansbaai: “I saw nine different Great Whites within arm’s reach. This changed my life forever. I realised that the only thing to fear in life is in fact fear itself.
CHEF AND CONSERVATIONIST Chef Shane Sauvage relaxing at the beach near his home in Voëlklip. PHOTO: Willow Sauvage Only too often it is our own fear that deprives us of some of life’s greatest experiences.”
restaurant, drink red wine and watch the whales breaching and bobtailing in the bay.”
Making good on his promise to his wife Janet and children Falcon and Willow that one day they would go and live by the sea, Shane says he finally shook off his fear and started making plans to realise his dream, diving “head first into my unknown future”. In Cape Fusion he writes: “Yes, coming face to face with a Great White Shark had finally given me the courage to step up and grab life by the balls and live it.”
Shane’s enthusiasm for coastal living and his passion for international fusion cuisine come together beautifully in Cape Fusion. Never satisfied with the ordinary, Shane realised even as a young boy that dining out was meant to be an extraordinary and memorable occasion. He chose his vocation early and followed his dream relentlessly, starting out as a bus boy and waiter during his school holidays. He also gained valuable experience during his military service in the army’s school of catering and developed a love for Italian cuisine while working at notable restaurants in Pretoria such as Rugatini and Giovanni’s.
Today, Shane is as well known for his generous support of marine conservation as he is for his unique style of fusion cooking. He regularly participates in fund-raising events and often hosts charity dinners at La Pentola. More recently he donated R10 000 to the Dyer Island Conservation Trust’s African Penguin & Seabird Sanctuary (APSS) near Gansbaai. He also relishes the sight of the Southern Right Whales in the bay and describes the whale season as one of winter’s highlights. “It is the joy of old friends coming to visit. This is when I like to sit by the fireplace at the
La Pentola Pretoria was launched in 1995 and right off the bat diners were seduced by Shane’s singular style of fusion cooking, with its culinary roots drawn from French, Italian and rich Mediterranean flavours, fused with South African elements and the best local produce available. The same
philosophy rules in the La Pentola Hermanus kitchen, where Shane’s magical touch of innovation and creativity is evident in every dish. While at first glance the combination of ingredients may seem unusual and even a bit startling, all Shane’s creations always respect the underlying principles of classic French cooking and the different tastes, colours and textures that come together on a plate make beautiful sense. Shane’s new adventure as an author started with The Edge of Fusion, published by Jacana in 2007. It is as much a celebration of South African culture as it is a recipe book, with the creative use of photographs that combine Shane’s dishes with iconic images of the “Rainbow Nation”. As the definitive guide to Afro-fusion cooking, easyto-follow recipes with detailed photographs of each step in the creative process fill the pages with vibrancy and excitement. “Fusion cooking is all about combining different ingredients and flavour components to create a new harmonious whole,” says Shane. “It’s
COOKING THE BOOKS Shane will present a talk in the Catholic Church hall on Friday 17 March at 10:00, hosted by U3A Overberg as part of their course on Cooking and Cookery Books. All three his cookbooks will be available for purchase after the talk. exactly what was happening in the country at the time and my cooking reflected that blurring of borders and bringing together different regional and international influences on a plate. The theme of the book was the sharing and embracing of different cultural elements.” For his second book, In Fusion, Shane focused on food and wine pairing, while also introducing a more personal touch in the form of photos and anecdotes about his family and staff members. This cookbook won the best South African chefs book published at the Gourmand Awards 2009 – an accolade he repeated with Cape Fusion, published in 2015. With combinations to tempt the palate and fill your table with a feast of innovative and delicious cuisine made easy for the home cook, Cape
Fusion is a sensory journey amplified by photographs of the natural beauty of the surrounding landscape. The contents page will give you an idea of what you are in for: Magical Mystery Tour, Kitchen Karate, Just because it’s lekker, Life’s a beach, Misty Morning, From the Earth, Market Culture, Neptune’s Gold. Once again, anecdotes about Shane’s wife Janet and teenagers Falcon and Willow are woven into the thread of the narrative, and there is a special section dedicated to their laatlammetjie, four-year-old Marina. It is a heart-warming book that is as much a celebration of food as it is of the many blessings in Shane’s life, which he sums up in Cape Fusion: “In life sometimes a change is the only miracle you need to see beyond and once again visualise the future.”