I am on the verge of taking out a restraining order against the persistent PR girl from hell. Her client is a perfectly innocuous 23-year-old chef whom, she has repeatedly informed me, deserves media coverage because "he looks like Robbie Williams".There are several problems with such an approach. First, there is the know-your-audience issue - Robbie Williams just doesn't do it for me. Youthful PR princesses wishing to persecute 38-year-old food critics need to research heart-throbs of the mid-1980s if they want to hit the hot spot.
Marc Guebert - Patrons go for consistency
Second, his food reflects serious salad days. There is nothing wrong with this kid that sacking the PR representative and spending a few more years in the kitchen won't put right. But at the moment he is deeply green in reason and just isn't yet mature enough to have anything very interesting to say on a plate.What follows is an investigation of the culinary icons at the other end of the age spectrum. The time is ripe for such an investigation: in a troubled economic environment, restaurant patrons favour tried-and-trusted over fashionable flash-in-the-pan.
Walter Ulz - More than three decades at the top
The career of Gallic gastronomic icon Marc Guebert deliciously illustrates the point. The chef estimates that since he arrived in SA in 1972, he has whipped up more than 400 000 of his signature soufflés; in more recent years at the legendary Île de France (later at Bistro 277) and, now, at the aptly named Le Soufflé in Pineslopes Shopping Centre, Fourways, Johannesburg.He says: "Everyone is feeling the recession right now, but I think those of us who have been doing this for a long time are less vulnerable to its effects than trendier restaurants.
"In hard times patrons who used to feed their faces indiscriminately become more cautious, and they go to the people who have shown that they can consistently deliver the goods. Besides, we have the stamina to stick it out when the going gets tough."
Freda Appelbaum - Honoured in France
The soufflé king is not wrong about the resilience of older restaurateurs. For the past 27 years, first at Hatfield House, then at Roggeland, Daljosaphat and most recently at Topsi & Co in Franschhoek, chef Topsi Venter has tirelessly served stylish renditions of local culinary classics. From springbok sausages to marvelous malva, if it's local-is-lekker you are after, Topsi Venter is your girl. Recent knee-replacement surgery made the 79-year-old chef take two weeks off. But she is now back in the brigade and cooking up a storm.Epicurean endurance is personified in 91-year-old chef Elsie Mauvis at Umhlanga's Ile Maurice in KwaZulu Natal, where she has spent the past four decades creating Mauritian Creole specialities. Madame Mauvis recently fell and broke her hip while striding about in her kitchen, so she now sits at a table supervising her staff and mixing up the palate-spiking mazavaroo chilli pastes that are testament to the magnificent fire in her soul and cooking pots.
Peter Veldsman - Champion of boere baroque
Besides, what goes around comes around in matters of food fashion. Sometimes literally. Roma Revolving Restaurant in Durban is one of only 31 spinning eateries left in the world. Why rotating while you eat ever fell out of favour I will never know, but the good news is that after 37 years in business, chef Gino Leopardi's tableside cr≖pes Suzette flambées are being gobbled up by a new generation of KZN cool kids who are hungry for its deliciously dated style.Similarly, Sandton's Linger Longer served its first guests in 1961. The current chef-patron is a relative newcomer, Walter Ulz having been drizzling truffled parmesan cream onto grateful langoustines and placing oysters Rockefeller before heiresses for a mere 33 years. Despite almost five decades at the top of the posh nosh pile, the restaurant has recently acquired a surprisingly hip, youthful fan base that relishes the retro-chic nature of the menu.
Retro-chic is one reason iconic age-old eateries can also be at the forefront of food fashion. The perpetual wild child award for endless innovation must surely go to chef Daniel Leusch, who has been cooking up a storm at La Madeleine, Pretoria, for 34 years. He gives the lie to the myth that innovation is the prerogative of the young. Whether it be fresh coriander in the chocolate pudding or bouillabaisse martinis, the man is a dynamo in the world of edible novelty.
If it's dining drama you're after, Peter Veldsman at Emily's in Cape Town has two decades of theatrics to his name. This pioneer in the field of promotion of SA flavours is also the undisputed heavyweight champion of boere-baroque. When on an SA food promotion in Germany, he insisted that the kitchen brigade ride ostriches into the banqueting hall. But unlike many of the younger epicurean experimenters, there is culinary substance to back up the over-the-top thrills.
Then there are those to whom we all owe the relative decency of 21st century dining. Callow youth may struggle to comprehend the alimentary, cultural and political importance of Eduan Naudé and Brian Shalkoff, who have been mixing things up at Jo'burg's Gramadoelas for 43 years, first in Joubert Park and now in Newtown's Market Theatre Precinct.
At the height of apartheid their exploration of the deluxe dining possibilities of African cuisine was as revolutionary as their non racial admissions policy.
Times may have changed but bravery is still a defining feature of our golden-oldie icons. While the young are busy PRing themselves into temporary fame, Le Canard's Freda Appelbaum earned a gold star from the gastronomic gods when she threw the 2007 Dine Top 100 restaurant judges out of her restaurant mid-meal.
Since she has been in business for 22 years and is one of only four women ever to be honoured in France as a Disciple of Escoffier, her conviction that whipper-snapper foodie fashionistas are a waste of her time and an invasion of her customers' space seems valid.
Ultimately, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. They may not look like Robbie Williams but the silver-side set have proved themselves on endless delicious plates across the decades.
For the record, any PR girls persistent enough to have made it to the bottom of this piece should know that Wham!'s Andrew Ridgeley will always hold the key to my heart.
When you have a chef who looks like him, please do give me a call.
Ranking the Analysts 2009
Le Soufflé: Tel: (011) 465-4116