So like I mentioned earlier, Saturday was Chantelle’s mom Cheryl’s birthday and as such the Montgomerys were spending the night at Gordon’s Beach Lodge, meaning that a night of eating out was surely on the cards in celebration of this event.
The designated venue of choice for the evening was Miguel’s Al Fornos, the quaint little beachside Italian eatery I’ve mentioned before on this blog and a place to quite a few people were looking forward to trying out again after having enjoyed rather good food the last time that they were there.
Our group for the supper was only six large, but for some or other reason Al Forno’s was doing really well for Saturday evening, meaning that when we phoned to book, they could only help us with a table outside on the patio, not the greatest of choices if you consider that despite the welcome, warm sun during the day, the nights tend to get bitterly cold when that chilly ocean breeze starts coming in.
However, on our arrival at 19:30 we were rather chuffed to learn that there had been a fortunate cancellation and as such, we got shown to a nice table inside with Monty, Cheryl, Monty’s folks, Chantelle and I sat ourselves down and got stuck straight into the business of belting out a very loud rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ to poor old Cheryl who sat cringing in the corner the whole way through.
Now admittedly on entrance we did notice that the restaurant seemed pretty busy, but it is a fairly small place so busy doesn’t actually mean busy if you know what I mean (it’s all relative, isn’t it?), but unfortunately none of us really clicked at just what was to come… a PAINFULLY long wait for our (and seemingly everyone else around us) food to arrive!
To make matters worse, when the food did finally arrive, half of it was just plain bad (although in fairness the starters WERE good), all thanks to the lengthy stay in the kitchen/oven that some of the meals had needed to endure while waiting for the complete order to finish up. At least the company was still good, so we steadfastly worked our way through the mains and finished up with some coffee (only Monty still wished to try his luck on dessert here – though in hindsight, they sounded as if they were pretty much sold out on all the good stuff already anyway!).
Damn it. Why is that every time we invite someone out from Bellville or Cape Town to Gordon’s Bay that the local restaurants always let us down? Man, these monkeys couldn’t even find a banana to put on my pizza – talk about a slip up!
Anyway, luckily we had Sunday morning’s Gordon’s Beach Lodge breakfast to make everything alright again when Chantelle outdid herself in providing an absolutely stellar breakfast experience at the guesthouse for the six of us (Cheryl, Monty and his folks had all slept over at the guesthouse) + two more of the GB resident Montgomery clan that were invited over to enjoy the experience with us as well.
Despite the growling weather, we had a fantastic, long sit down get together (and I had a fabulous, patented C omelette), so hopefully that made everything alright and wiped out Saturday evening’s rather poor experience – it’s never good when the birthday girl’s food arrives so dried out that you’d need a pickaxe just to eat it! :)
So hopefully you enjoyed your birthday out here in Gordon’s Bay after all Cheryl – we’ll smack those blokes at Al Forno’s behind the head for you as soon as possible, promise! ;)
Though maybe next year we’ll celebrate it in Bellville instead!