Thorn Tree: Luxury ‘country’ lodge 20 minutes from town

Wining & Dining
I was asked if I’d like to sample the St Valentine’s Day menu at Thorn Tree Lodge, Glen Lorne at supper last Wednesday.

I was asked if I’d like to sample the St Valentine’s Day menu at Thorn Tree Lodge, Glen Lorne at supper last Wednesday.

Eating with Dusty Miller

“Sure”, I said. “Thanks very much, but what am I supposed to do with the story? It won’t appear until more than a week after the event!”

We rescheduled for Tuesday, enabling me to meet deadlines for this Sunday. (The last two years people have phoned me at 8 o’clock-ish asking where they could get a table!)

Absolutely lovely Thorn Tree Lodge boutique hotel re-opened just over a year ago. Don’t ask me how long it was shut; the last time I was there was for The Standard’s Restaurant of the Year awards in (I think) 2006.

A few years before that, when the late, lamented Murelle Hayes ran the place as a hotel and catering training school, students and staff were scarily robbed at ruthless gun-point by AK47-toting thugs. The last time I saw Murelle on an AZ flight to Gatwick, in 2008, a year before she died suddenly and ages after that incident, she said ZRP were still investigating!

If Thorn Tree were in the Cape and you heard it was 100 or 200 years old, you wouldn’t argue. But it certainly wasn’t there 38 years ago, when I lived in Glen Lorne, then recently incorporated into the capital city, with no PTC street mail deliveries, using hand-cranked ancient telephone hand-sets on multi-user party lines.

The lodge lies on 25 hectares of lush rolling African veldt filled with exotic birds. The property is dissected by a pretty streamlet which becomes a roaring, raging river (presumably the Umwindsi?) after a storm, like we had on Tuesday at dusk. It feeds a splendid reed-filled dam which is home to a pair of breeding African Fish Eagles. Apart from eponymous thorn trees, there are many mature umbrella acacias and stately blue gums.

Architecture is Cape Dutch; the place is filled with breathtaking antiques and collectibles: furniture, paintings, timepieces, scientific instruments, books, an original HMV phonogram; greying heavily framed lithographs of Victorian worthies in clerical garb or Masonic aprons; stuffed animals and hunting trophies. The place could be gloomy, perhaps should be gloomy but a kind natural light and airiness plus lots of loving elbow grease on anything needing dusting or polishing makes the whole collection stunning.

Guests’ rooms and suites, on the other hand are the last word in contemporaneous efficiency and modern comfort. I had a bed the size of a snooker table, walk-in needle point shower, freestanding Victorian-styled bath tub with silver-plated ball-and-claw feet, twin wash hand basins, huge flat screen TV in the living room area, which also boasted a dining/boardroom style table seating eight and two sofas.

Six of us tried the St Valentine’s Day dinner. Starters were a choice of miniature trio fish pie with a side salad, a huge portion of sticky chili beef gudgeons on a bed of micro-greens, orange and pomegranate salsa, or my choice: Which was a richly rewarding and satisfying fairly coarse chicken liver paté with lemon garlic and herb toast and sweet tomato chutney.

Russian-born Steve Sugden, a young entrepreneur who owns the place with fiancée Tarryn Crundall, and I agreed the only possible fault with the scrumptious paté was that it needed more mouthwatering garlicky toast on which it could be spread. That was soon rectified and every delicious morsel finished.

Tarryn also runs West Agencies and among her imported food and drink lines she has the Zimbabwe agency for the magnificent Solms-Delta Wines from Franschhoek in the Cape, which I toured fairly recently. This was poured generously at our sampling; each couple will receive a bottle of that label’s sparkling wine on the actual night.

Their sparkling Shiraz is totally stunning with suggested aphrodisiacal qualities!

Main courses offered were a very meaty chunk of export quality Zimbabwean fillet of beef, stuffed with Stilton cheese and wrapped in smoky, streaky bacon, served with red wine gravy, Dauphinoise potatoes and seasonal vegetables; or a North African dish of chicken tagine with apricots, sultanas and a spicy tomato sauce with rice.

Asparagus shoots

Possibly predictably, I ordered the fish tower trio; ginormous grand tasty slab of poached fillet of salmon, tilapia fillet and four of five grilled prawns, with creamy mashed parsley potatoes, carrots (which I didn’t get…no train smash!) and lovely young green asparagus shoots with Hollandaise sauce. I struggled to clear my plate, which was a shame as colours, textures and flavours came together as a stupendous whole.

That probably means I shouldn’t have been entitled to pudding! But after a digestion break during which conversation veered between… disgraced chief executives and who’s next?; to the parlous state of the Zim economy (what economy?); the ultra-boring succession saga; Zim’s entry in the Russian Winter Olympics (true, 20-year-old skiing expert Luke Steyn is in the slalom and grand slalom!) and Zimbabwean-born commando Marine Craig Buchanan winning the much coveted British Military Cross last week… the sweets arrived.

Tall, pencil-slim, elegant Tarryn (she and Steve will marry in Cape Town soon) ordered an off-menu fresh fruit salad which looked dazzling.

I don’t think anyone had the sharing chocolate fondue with marshmallows, strawberries and banana. Warm brownie with vanilla bean ice-cream attracted a couple of orders. But most of us went for heart-shaped meringues, which were as light as a kiss, filled with fresh cream and decorated with halved strawberries.

We finished with coffee and more talk, which included what a first rate job head chef Gift Chigome and his team had done for eight very satisfied punters.

Pelting rain (a storm of Biblical proportions) turned to light rain and drizzle by midnight, but next day was bright and shining without the awful humidity we’d been experiencing. I yomped around the property doing a little early morning bird-watching before a trencherman’s breakfast of cereal and banana- flavoured yoghurt; eggs, bacon, sausage, baked beans, sautéed mushrooms, grilled tomato and toast with tea.

On St Valentine’s Day a similar three-course supper with bottle of bubbly, entertainment by Daniel Jenkins, overnight luxurious accommodation, breakfast and a complimentary “couple’s massage” next day will be US$180 per person; dinner and wine only US$100 per person at this country destination only 20 minutes from the CBD.

Thorn Tree Lodge, 29, Enterprise Road, Glen Lorne. Bijoux/boutique country hotel in the city. Child friendly. Not especially handicapped friendly, but no insurmountable architectural challenges. Fully licensed. No smoking indoors. Secure parking on-site. Tel 0772 269 103 or 494743-5. [email protected]

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