No time to linger over a tasting menu? FYN makes fine dining fast

Peter Tempelhoff’s new restaurant, FYN, on the rooftop of the historic Speakers Corner building in the Cape Town CBD, is pioneering a new style of fine dining for a fast-paced city lifestyle.

“Nobody in the city has the time for fine-dining tasting menus,” says Peter. “We thought, let’s take all the flavours of a three-hour tasting menu and do it in under two hours.” He achieves this with Japanese-inspired kaiseki trays, giving each diner their own tray of three or four dishes at a time. 

We start with a bento box of exquisite canapes. A tiny prawn samosa, a crunchy daikon maki roll, a gorgeous sea bass nigiri, each one incredibly detailed, delivering a tantalising mouthful of bliss.

After a bread course of sesame sprinkled baguette dipped in melting bone marrow ash, our kaiseki trays of starters arrive.

Each of the four dishes is a meal in miniature, an intense series of tastes: poached scallop on braised onions and subtly spiced lentil velouté, seared tuna with kelp biltong, pickled cucumber with shiso, succulent quail with glazed eel, parsnip puree and tiny squares of tea-aged pear.

Peter’s love for Japanese cuisine and culture comes through in the presentation. “The minimalism of it appeals to me,” he says. “It’s got to balance for the eyes first, even the way the plates go on the trays has to be harmonious.”

Chef Ashley Moss heads up the FYN kitchen, previously head chef at Peter’s award-winning Greenhouse in Constantia, and is working the same culinary magic here.

A superb wine list courtesy of Jennifer Hugé (previously front of house manager at La Colombe), includes wines not found anywhere else, such as Neil Ellis’ Op sy Moer, a stunning smooth blend of palomino, grenache blanc and chenin blanc, of which only 380 bottles were made.

Roast guinea fowl is our main course, elegant and satisfying, with poached leeks, wood ear mushrooms and miso cream, paired with deep velvet Vriesenhof Pinotage 2009.

Lastly a kaiseki tray of three sublime desserts: blueberries and yuzu, chocolate and salted Japanese plum, and lime compressed strawberries with green tea and white chocolate, making us want to linger over every mouthful, soaking up views of Table Mountain, and paragliders around Lion’s Head, before heading back out into the city bustle below.

This article was originally published in the Sunday Times Neighbourhood: Property and Lifestyle guide. Visit Yourneighbourhood.co.za