It was a night of strange beginnings as our intention had been to review another eatery, situated in Bree Street. On arrival we were greeted, not by the warm welcome of a maitre d’, but by the sight of a seemingly closed down restaurant.
This was very odd as the booking had been made and confirmed the day prior. The intention was to review their 2-for-1 burger special. In hindsight, we should’ve rather gone to Newlands to experience 2-for-1 during the Protea’s run chase against India, happening on the same night.
A contingency plan was needed! Luckily, Bree Street has a number of decent watering holes one can stop off at in times of crisis. It took one beer for us to reach a consensus that we would try Tiger’s Milk in Kloof Street, which is the latest offering of this growing restaurant chain belonging to the Harbour House Group. It has one entrance in Rheede Street which opens onto its very impressive wrap-around bar. The sign outside this entrance says it all – Bar Splendido!
There is truly no better way to describe it. As with all of the other Tiger’s Milk restaurants, the décor is extremely well thought out and on point. From the bar the restaurant extends inwards, eventually leading to a vast outside section which wraps around onto Kloof Street. We were lucky to have gotten seating near to the front, right next to the bar. The place was packed – but not uncomfortably so. Our waiter, McDonald started off like a house on fire by getting our first drinks orders to us in the blink of an eye. Tiger’s Milk brews its own craft beers in-house which is available through all of their restaurants. I went for my customary lager (ingeniously named “Tiger’s Milk Lager”) while the other brus went for a Part Wolf Pilsner. Both of these beers are extremely easy drinking and perfect for very warm summers nights, such as this one was. Once we had hydrated sufficiently, it was on to starters. The choice of starters was varied and included two calamari dishes. We decided to go for one of their main pizza’s with Bacon, Avo and Feta (again, ingeniously named – “Bacon, Avo, Feta”).
WOW! Crispy with a great covering of toppings. What more can you want in a pizza?!
Once the pizza was klapped, as that is the best way to describe its obliteration, we had a tough choice deciding on what to each have for our mains – it was obviously burgers, but which ones?
Now these were some of the most kick-ass names for burgers – Stepchild, The Big Cheese, Evil Twin, Magic Mushroom, Tree Hugger, Moaning @ Midnight, Rockstar, Triple Bypass….hardcore names which needed to deliver on flavour!
I went for their Moaning @ Midnight which was topped with mature cheddar, bacon, fried egg, baconaise and bacon jam. The other brus went for a Triple Bypass (topped with a cheese slice, bacon and truffle-infused mushroom sauce), a Rockstar (topped with a cheese slice, guacamole and bacon) and The Big Cheese (topped with a cheese slice and a three cheese sauce) – all accompanied with chips. The choices of toppings were too difficult for myself and one of the other brus to decide on so we decided to go “halvies” to get the best of both worlds. I would most definitely have done it again, as both burgers (my Moaning @ Midnight and his Triple Bypass) were clearly different, but sublime! The bru who had the Rockstar waxed lyrical about it, however, the other bru who had The Big Cheese – not so much. Whilst ours were all “through the roof” good, he described his to be decent but not worth ordering the same again.
On a night (and, no doubt, this is probably the case for every night at this place) where it was so busy, it is very difficult for a waitron to be completely on top of each of his or her tables. The way that all of their staff were willing to pitch in and help each other throughout the night was testament to the professionalism of the set-up. Kudo’s to them for that – lesser establishments would have struggled far more with how they deal with such a crowded restaurant. The one fault I had with McDonald was that he didn’t catch my joke about how he was clearly working for the wrong burger restaurant – although it was probably more a case that he thought it was a crap joke!
After settling our bill we then proceeded to having a night cap at the outside seating area which was still completely full with patrons.
Just before going outside, one of the brus became starstruck by some local sporting legends who were present on the night (no doubt so they could be mentioned in this review). The fun-loving cricketing prodigy whose match-winning innings won South Africa the famous ‘438 cricket match’ against Australia, along with South Africa’s top swimmer and his “Unbelievable” dad were clearly having a great time.
It was great to see, as they were clearly not alone – with the other 100s of people on the night bearing testament to the fact that this restaurant is an absolute winner for any occasion. What an experience, and what an awesome new addition to Cape Town’s ever growing list of world class establishments!
Ratings
Beginnings – great variety. The pizza we had was off the mains list – and it was awesome! 4
Burgers – absolutely delicious! The flavour combos were some of the best we have had. 4.5
Beers – Very nice beers which are brewed in-house, but also very limited in choice. 2.5
Bringers – McDonald was very professional but as it was so busy he was also very stretched. Great to see how all of the waitrons really help each other out. 4
Background – Absolutely nothing to fault! You will not find a better vibe – anywhere. 5