A treasury of nearly forgotten indigenous plants and trees is now firmly rooted at the new Dik Delta Fynbos Reserve, on Franschhoek’s Solms-Delta Wine Estate, thanks to the collaborative efforts of plant and cultural preservationists. At the heart of the reserve is a Fynbos Culinary Garden, its beds yielding edible plants and herbs used in the heritage cuisine of the estate’s Fyndraai restaurant.
Dik Delta was officially opened on Thursday 19 August 2010 with the staff of the reserve lighting a huge bonfire performing a traditional Khoe blessing ceremony.
The vision behind the garden is that of farm owner Mark Solms, who wishes to preserve the Cape’s rich bio-heritage and that of its indigenous people, the Khoe, in a living and practical way. The lives of the Cape’s first settlers revolved around some 400 plant species that nourished them and cured their ailments. Thousands of years of valuable plant material and knowledge were nearly eradicated by colonization and European-style agricultural practises. “We are attempting to go back, and hopefully regain some of the opportunities that short-sighted commercial farming took away from us,” said Solms.
The garden has been painstakingly cultivated, plant by plant, with botanical material sourced from Cape nurseries and identified in the wild. Integral to this process was well-known food scientist, author and national treasure Renata Coetzee, who has spent 50 years studying South Africa’s culinary heritage. An authority on Khoe food culture, Coetzee helped select the plants for the culinary garden based on their promise and adaptability in the kitchen of Solms-Delta’s restaurant, Fyndraai. Ethno-botanist Alan Sonnenberg, who has spent most of his career studying indigenous plants, assisted by scouring the Cape for botanical treasures, many of which are on the verge of extinction.
Over 80 varieties of indigenous plants and trees now thrive on a 15-hectare parcel of land once used for grazing, fruit production, and even rubbish disposal. Overgrown with alien vegetation, the land took several years to clear. “It is now a living repository for real cultural goods,” says Hein Joubert, Dik Delta Project Manager. Joubert is a Franschhoek resident and heritage enthusiast with an architectural background, and has unlimited enthusiasm for the reserve and its potential. Visitors to the garden will be able to smell, feel and taste these precious plants on guided walks arranged through the estate’s Museum van de Caab.
The 2-hectare Dik Delta Culinary Garden is an area of the reserve devoted exclusively to cultivation. At its centre is a circle — always the traditional meeting place within African culture — from which avenues lined with stones excavated from the site radiate outwards. Edible plantings of buchu, spekboom and others fill the beds, which will eventually be outlined by shady kei apple and other trees from the Khoe landscape. The main avenue directs the eye up towards the dramatic mountains beyond. Old citrus trees planted alongside the garden have been resuscitated and are now awaiting organic certification – a process that takes up to two years. The garden is tended by a team of Solms-Delta workeers who were once unemployed farm residents. They were part of the creative process from the beginning, contributing design ideas as well as labour.
After plants are harvested, Chef Shaun Schoeman of Fyndraai takes over, transforming strongly flavoured fynbos and succulents into heritage cuisine. The menu pulls exclusively from the Cape’s genuine food traditions — mixing Dutch colonial and Malay slave with Khoe ingredients — in a way that excites the modern palate without over-stimulating it.
Schoeman plays with Dik Delta produce to create memorable dishes like a veldkos vegetable bake with bokmelkkaas, garden leaves and boegoe buttermilk sauce, and a lightly smoked ostrich fan fillet served with a waterblommetjie tart, honey roasted patat emulsion, buttermilk suringsous and spekboomslaai.
The Dik Delta project also involved the extensive restoration of a natural river bed, which now flows gently in winter and is dry in summer. Its banks are lined with stones, reedy restios and acacias. Rejuvenating the river bed has stimulated a return of this landscape to its previous glory, according to Joubert, who notes the symbiotic return of other long-lost plants, as well as a profusion of frogs, badgers, porcupines, cranes and hawks.
Herds of fat-tail sheep, Sanga cattle and ostrich have also been more formally introduced to another section of the reserve. The sheep’s high fat content helped sustain Khoe farmers thousands of years ago, and the Sanga, with their magnificent spotted hides and graceful horns came here with the Khoe from central Africa two thousand years ago.. Both sheep and cattle are flourishing at Dik Delta, and even reproducing in their authentic kraal. Joubert hopes that, like the plants, the animals will “jumpstart a conversation about how the first South Africans once lived.”
“Whether visitors are strolling along the reserve’s fynbos-scented avenues or tasting the fruit of the gardens at Fyndraai, the educational element must always be fun and meaningful to adults and children alike,” says Solms. Also planned are stargazing evenings which will bring astronomy to life. Under the night sky in Dik Delta’s large boma, participants will tap into the celestial beliefs of the early Khoe and San, which played such a critical role in how they conducted their lives.
It’s only natural that Dik Delta will extend its culinary reach beyond Fyndraai Restaurant. Several food products handmade from garden produce are currently under development. Look for honeybush tea, traditional jams, atchjars and syrups with the Dik Delta label, in the months to come.
All arrangements for visiting Dik Delta should be made through the Museum van de Caab at Solms-Delta Wine Estate. Email; tel: 021-874 3937.
View our Dik Delta Photo gallery from our launch event on our Facebook page.
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