Rick’s Cafe in Park Road seems to have become a vibey option for a week night. It’s not easy to find a place that has a good vibe on a wintery week night, so it’s nice to know that Rick’s can provide that. I’ve eaten there twice and been twice for drinks over the past couple of months.
I have always liked the venue. It used to be a restaurant called Simply Salmon, then a night club called Clockwork, then I think it was used for offices and now it has become a restaurant again. It’s a 100 year old Victorian (is that supposed to be capitalised?) building, so it has plenty of character. It has a veranda out front and down the side for alfresco dining, the main dining area shares the ground floor with the small bar area. Then upstairs is a lounge with a big screen TV and a large balcony with plenty of tables which is going to be super in summer.
The menu is quite broad. There is a section of ‘Global Tapas’ offering small dishes ranging from about R20 to about R40. I particularly enjoyed the Baked Portobello Mushroom covered with creamy spinach (R32) and the Roasted Pork Riblets (R29). The rest are nice too except I wasn’t over impressed with the Stuffed Calamari (R35). One of the owners is one of the guys who started Buena Vista Social Cafe, so it wasn’t surprising to see tapas on the menu. The rest of the menu offers salads, light meals (burgers (R44), steaks (R52), fish & chips (R46), etc.), vegetarian items and items from the grill and obviously dessert.
I can’t remember much about the wine list, except you can order a few things by the carafe instead of bottle or glass, which is useful if you want more than a glass but not a whole bottle. More restaurants should offer this.
The service was neither impressive nor unimpressive. As I mentioned before, there is a nice vibe so if you’re looking for a place with a bit of a buzz, check out Rick’s Cafe Americain.
Rick’s Cafe Americain
2 Park Road Gardens
Tel: 021 424 1100
http://www.rickscafe.co.za/
Comments
3 responses to “Rick’s Cafe Americain review”
I ate here again last night. I was interested to see how the food would be because my last couple of visits were quite disappointing. I was pleasantly surprised, the food was actually really good (mine in particular). I had the Ostrich steak (R88) and while it’s not a very big portion it was prepared perfectly. I shared it with the person next to me in return for some of their Chicken Ceasar Salad (R49) which was awesome.
Other dishes we tried were the Kudu, the Fish & Chips, the Rump with Gorgonzola and Onion sauce (very nice sauce) and one person had the stuffed calamari tapa. Everyone was happy with their food but a little envious of mine (that’s the way I like it).
We drank Bilton Shiraz (R145) which is an excellent wine. We also passed around a Chocolate Mousse for dessert. It was very rich, a teaspoon or two was more than enough for me.
My only complaint is that the food took about 45 minutes to arrive, and they don’t bring bread for the table or anything so if it wasn’t for the great company I might have jumped up and down. They could have at least come and apologised for taking so long.
The reason we went to Rick’s was because we were looking for a place that would be busy on a Monday night and true to my original review, it was busy and offered the atmosphere we were looking for. So it still gets my recommendation.
yes, Victorian is written with a capital letter. 🙂 x
Some other comments on Rick’s can be found on my restaurant specials post (even though they’re not running a special!):
http://relaxwithdax.com/?p=1179&cpage=2#comment-38642