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The Braai

Obviously, the braai has played a central role in our advancement as a species. The oldest archaeological evidence of the braai was discovered at the Sterkfontein Caves in the north of our country and is about one million years old. So South Africans invented the braai.

But that’s only partially accurate. As all human beings originated in Southern Africa, only trekking north fifty or sixty thousand years ago, so I guess we have to share this special tradition with all people. It just happened to start in our back yard. It’s therefore fitting that we celebrate a National Braai day every year, the figurehead of which is our favourite man of God, and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

As the awakening sun stretches ever earlier over the Hottentots Holland and the days shrug off their blanket of winter cloud, there’s a distracting itch that starts deep down in my central brain where my sense of smell resides. I can’t quite put a finger on it, let alone give it a good scratch. It’s nagging me. It’s a constant, disconsolate, ancient buzz and it’s messing up my weekend.

Maybe it’s all those emails I didn’t get to by Friday, or the microbiological stability results we are waiting for to start bottling another massive run of Kumala. But now it’s early Sunday morning and the kids have jumped on my head to wake me up, and I can’t shake this feeling that I should be doing something critically important to my very being.

My eldest boy looks out of the window, up to the mountain and the crisp, clear, light blue sky. “Dad,” he says slowly, then pauses and thinks silently. He seems transfixed by the shimmering granite slopes soaring benevolently above us.

“Dad, it actually looks like a day for the braai,” he says in a very clear, measured tone.

That’s it! That’s the scratch that needs itching, the buzz that needs quieting. It’s been far too long since we braaied, and I realise – that’s the problem with the world.

Positive traditions are important. They are the cradle-matrix of our precarious existence, creating a flexible but powerful connectivity through pivotal elements of a shared history.

This connectivity is a fabric woven of myths and heroes. One of the biggest issues dysfunctional pockets of society share is a void of positive myths. The same way we need water and food to sustain the body, we need positive myths and traditions to sustain a functioning, equal, sustainable society.

In an instant I am on the ‘phone calling up a few friends. Still groggy from sleep, I can hear them perk up on the other side of the line while I outline the plan. If they had other commitments, they quickly weighed up their priorities and readily offer to bring the peripheral braai essentials.

Of course, it’s very dangerous to accept such generosity, because it may open the door to braai abuse. Braai abuse is an insidious, widespread problem, born from the delusion that your friends can braai better than you.

I make the mistake of accepting some freshly home-baked bread and the friend jumps in with audacity to offer a marinade as well. Ha! I decline with the most incredulous laugh I can manage although, deep down, I know she makes a really delicious braai marinade from a secret recipe her grandmother passed onto her, and her alone. Still, there is pride at stake here.

It must have been early, because I also accept an organic rocket salad from another, and the pirate immediately asks if he can bring some meat from his farm. No, damn it! I don’t care if it’s biodynamic, free range, Royal Khoisan-crossed, Great Karoo lamb that’s only ever eaten life-enhancing, medicinal scrubland herbs all its life. Triumphantly, I ignore him completely, blaming his mobile phone reception, and putting the receiver down.

If the Sterkfontein Caves were the site of illuminating archaeological digs, giving us enormous insight into how we developed as an early species, discoveries along the southern Cape coast seem to indicate this was where humans first started thinking like humans — where cognitive thought blossomed.

And here too the braai played a hugely significant role. It seems our ancestors learnt how to transform stone for tools and weapons by throwing pieces into the coals of the braai — this is arguably the oldest evidence of cognitive thought, preceding even the 77 000 year old clay mathematical tabled found at Blombos Cave recently.

I’ve always tried to make wine that compliments brilliant cuisine — wine that I can show with confidence alongside any food in the world, no matter how fine or exotic; and no matter in which far-flung city or culture I find myself.

But the real test for wine is a braai with my friends.

South Africa may be the miracle nation. We may have four Nobel Peace Prize Laureates. We may be hosting the Soccer World Cup. We may be the Rugby World Champions. We may be the birthplace of the human species. Indeed, we may be the Promised Land for all I can tell.

But far, far more importantly, we are also the spiritual keepers of the oldest surviving human tradition — the braai. And as a South African winemaker, your wine better stand up to that inheritance and responsibility.

As said friends start to arrive, the first glass of Sauvignon Blanc is poured.

“You might not be able to braai,” someone quips, “but you make a damn fine Sauvignon Blanc.”

“Anyone can make a decent wine from Elim grapes,” I say. This is true.

A new tribe of kids are scurrying around. Books and toys are forgotten upstairs as they excitedly collect old newspaper from the recycling bin and last year’s vine cane kindling to start their own braai. If a six year old can’t build his own braai, and cook his own Cape salmon fillet in my house, he isn’t allowed to braai marshmallows on a stick for pudding.

Before I have shaken my friends’ hands, the chirping has started. It is immediately pointed out that I’ve rolled the newspaper too tightly for effective combustion. My sauces are smelt cautiously, almost suspiciously, and the Kudu fillet prodded, as though they can tell from this action how it was shot and hung.

With atavistic reverence and a little prayer to God and our ancestors, I build the vine cuttings and Black Wattle hardwood over the newspaper. Then a match is struck and the day really begins. Soon the smell of braai smoke calls forth some reds, and the Dragon Tree is opened, and I am again told how much better my winemaking is than my braaing.

It’s only later, in the short, deep silence that follows the first considered mouthful that respect is communicated. And this is fitting, because after so many hundreds of thousands of years of practice, us humans really don’t have much interest in a bad braai.