PRESS RELEASE – On Sunday 18 November, the winners of the 2018 Eat Out Mercedes-Benz Restaurant Awards will be announced at GrandWest in Cape Town. The red carpet, black tie event is held annually to celebrate the best South African restaurants, chefs and sommeliers.
To celebrate the wealth of talent on the restaurant scene, Eat Out will announce 30 nominees prior to the event and count down from 20 to 11 at the ceremony, before finally revealing the Top 10. The winning restaurants will be chosen by a core panel of anonymous judges, with Margot Janse as the judging convener.
“Honouring the extraordinary talent in South Africa is what Eat Out is all about,” says Aileen Lamb, MD of New Media, which owns Eat Out. “This awards ceremony is where we get to celebrate our world-class chefs and the magnificent work being done in the food industry as a whole.”
Mercedes-Benz South Africa is the sponsor for this prestigious awards ceremony for the fifth consecutive year. “We’re thrilled to recognise local chefs and restaurants around South Africa whose culinary delights exceed expectations year after year,” says Selvin Govender, Marketing Director of Mercedes-Benz Cars. To honour the Restaurant of the Year, the head chef will receive a luxury Mercedes-Benz for the duration of their reign.
Aside from Margot Janse, the panel will remain anonymous after the judging has concluded, as this enables the judges to remain on the panel for the coming year(s) to ensure greater consistency. As always, their scorecards will be audited before the announcement and chefs will be able to obtain feedback from Eat Out after the awards. The criteria to determine the nominees and winners remain the same as in previous years but, as in 2017, slightly more weighting will be given to food.
In addition to naming the hotly contested Top 10 restaurants, the 2018 Eat Out Mercedes-Benz Restaurant Awards will award recognition in a number of categories such as the Eat Out S.Pellegrino & Acqua Panna Chef of the Year, the Eat Out Retail Capital New Restaurant of the Year and the Eat Out Graham Beck Chefs’ Chef Award.
Limited tickets are now available for the 2018 Eat Out Mercedes-Benz Restaurant awards for R1595 per person at Quicket. Mingle with the South Africa’s hottest chefs while sipping on sparkling wine and enjoying a luxurious multi-course meal.
The annual Eat Out magazine includes the Eat Out 500, a power list of great restaurants across South Africa, as reviewed by a panel of food and restaurant industry experts. The 2019 Eat Out magazine, filled with professional reviews and curated content on South Africa’s top 500 restaurants, will go on sale after the Eat Out Mercedes-Benz Restaurant Awards.
ALSO READ: SA food blogger behind the über popular Milo cake recipe makes finals of international blog awards