Moemas Patisserie & Food Shop in Parktown Quarter in Parktown North is a place where you cannot help but drool, especially if you have a sweet tooth. There is even a sign etched on the large window next to the entrance behind which are split-levels of delectable cakes, tarts and other beautifully styled temptations. It reads: ‘Don’t drool on our glass.’

Danielle Postma

From when she can remember Danielle Postma remembers watching her grandmother, Joy Anderson, in the kitchen. ‘She was an exceptional cook and the inspiration for the name, Moemas,’ says Danielle. ‘Her oldest granddaughter, Niven, couldn’t get her tongue round Ouma so called her Moema. It stuck.’

In the mid 90s Danielle headed for London to work as an au pair for a woman who had trained as chef in New York. ‘She inspired me to enrol at Prue Leith in London. One of the lecturers, Yotam Ottolenghi of Baker & Spice, made a huge impression on her and she pestered him until he employed her as a pastry chef. I worked for him for years and remember thinking that if his bakeries were my shops, I’d just sit in the corner and watch people eating my food.’

She also worked at Sally Clarkes and Ottolenghi’s. It was during this time that she met free spirit Mike Caudle at a club. He had been a drummer, lived in New York and was then managing a care home for the disabled. She would tell him of her dream of opening a patisserie.

Moemas

After ten years Danielle was desperately homesick and persuaded Mike to come with her to Johannesburg. They started a small catering business out of their kitchen supplying select restaurants and when the premises in Parktown Quarter became available three years ago they jumped at the chance to realise their dream.

‘When we got here I realised there was no one doing fresh cakes in Joburg and I knew that was my niche.’

While Moemas took off from the moment it opened, it was initially tough on the couple. ‘Danielle was way ahead of me in the business, but we wanted to do it together,’ laughs Mike. ‘The problem is we’re both fairly single-minded and it was a baptism of fire finding a way to work together. But we figured it out along the way as to how we could keep our beautiful shop and our beautiful relationship. We can now communicate on a deeper, gentler level as we’ve connected as to how the other works in an emotional way. It was invaluable in preparing us for parenthood.’

A Touch of Fuchsia

Other than for the food laden displays, Moemas has a clean white interior that spills onto the popular pavement. The colour is provided by the fuchsia mural on the back wall and the serviettes. It is beautiful, inviting, relaxed and the staff friendly, but there is no way to describe the food other than out of this world. Mind blowingly stunning. 

‘The Moemas philosophy is very much “slow food”,’ says Danielle. ‘We want patrons to take as much time enjoying our meals as we’ve put into creating them. It is about joy, beauty, quality and all the things that are important to us – like good people, good, fresh food, cakes and pastries, made daily on the premises, with seasonal produce, and only the best quality ingredients.’

Sweet Heaven

Moemas is open seven days a week for breakfast, lunch and high tea, with a new menu printed each day. For breakfast there is the normal fare with special touches, but why be normal when there are treats like sugar-crusted muffins packed with chunks of real fruit, a range of brioches and their awn granola. For lunch I like the full range of salads, short-crust pastry pies, savoury tarts, smoked salmon and chicken leg quarters marinated in lemon, honey, saffron and rosemary.

You’ll battle to find anything better in South Africa than the savoury offerings, but they have absolutely no peer when it comes to the sweet stuff. This is sweet heaven. There are honey, chocolate bundt, carrot, vineyard, apple and calvados, and banana and caramel cakes; chocolate éclairs like you’ve never had before; fruit galette, white chocolate and pistachio, baked custard, lemon meringue, lemon curd & Mascarpone, baked cheesecake and fresh fruit tarts; pecan bars, Belgian chocolate brownies, fudge brownie shortbread, macaroons; and donuts a New York cop would kill for.       

Moemas can be hired for evening functions. They will customise a cake for any occasion and cater outside parties. With a smile. I can’t recommend them highly enough.