Queen Of The Kitchen | Lynne Powers
Stirring The Pot…
Lynne Powers has be in Hermanus for years, she has raised her family here, runs a catering business that caters for events across the Overberg and is also the owner and chef of The Cuckoo Tree.
One thing is for sure, Lynne has a special set of skills, the art of making people feel happy and comforted through food. A quick scroll through the menu will leave you to return day after day to tuck into old loved classics like, oxtail potjie, mussel chowder, liver and onions and pap and vleis. Not to mention delectable sweet treats like their mouthwatering cheesecake and lemon meringue.
See what this Hermanus local had to say to us…
What inspired you to become part or the restaurant and catering business?
I sort of fell into the catering business first, which I absolutely love and it is very successful. I suppose the next step was to try my hand in the restaurant trade, so when the Cuckoo Tree came up I grabbed it.
Chefs are nuts…
One must be nuts to want to live an unhealthy lifestyle, constant pressure, long hours and a vocabulary like Gordon Ramsay.
If you weren’t a chef you would be…
A lady of leisure …. bliss!! No, joking aside, I would probably get involved again (I did this before the catering) with patient care, along with CANSA or the hospice.
If I am not in the kitchen I am…
Found at home with my feet up, doing absolutely nothing, which I have perfected to a fine art!
If you date or marry a chef you need to know…
Your partner or spouse would need to realize that there will be no cooking once you get home!
What’s a trendy food or ingredient that you are sick of by now…
Balsamic glaze and jus, enough already!
You can’t buy happiness but you can buy cupcakes, and that is kind of the same thing! – Anonymous
Does Hermanus inspire your food, if so how?
Not really, I find the choice of interesting, different fresh food ingredients very limited. I think rather that my locals inspire me as to the food I make.
If Hermanus was a dish of food what would it be and why?
Oxtail – Warm, rich and fulfilling.
If Hermanus was a wine what would it be?
Iona’s, Sophie Terblanche, more than 2 bottles will send your inhibitions right out the window. She is intoxicating, but, will bite you on the butt!
Hermanus is…
Eclectic and vibrant with some very, very colourful characters!
My best childhood memories are…
Sitting around the kitchen table watching my grandmother baking and making the most delicious orange preserve.
I wish I knew then what I do now about…
I wish I had known then that I would be in the food industry, I would have really paid a lot more attention to what my grandmother was doing. Can I make orange preserve….. definitely not!