Secret Hotel Finds: There’s an Entire Veggie Garden Growing on The Palace Rooftop
There’s nothing quite like a soul rejuvenating holiday but a lot goes on behind the scenes to ensure a guest’s hotel stay is simply magical. From the housekeeping faeries plumping up your pillows to the chefs carefully selecting the very best ingredients for your dinner that night, there’s a carefully choreographed hospitality ballet going just out of the guests’ view. So, it comes as no surprise that many hotels are keeping a little ace up their proverbial sleeve, things that aren’t apparent to the guests but that help to make their stay just a little more exceptional. Take for example, The Palace at Sun City. Located in the North West bush, you’d never expect the resort to house a thriving vegetable garden…on the roof of the hotel no less!
On trend with all things organic and sustainable, The Palace at Sun City has revealed its very own rooftop vegetable sanctuary featuring. The hotel’s Executive Chef Hanroe Erasmus grows his very own vegetables and herbs — all organic and absolutely delicious. But these aren’t your usual garden varieties, the garden boasts some rare vegetable finds that would get any chef excited.
Spanning 75 square metres atop the hotel’s roof, the crops use no fertilisers or pesticides whatsoever and feature an array of herbs and veggies that are not your usual supermarket finds, such as Purple kohlrabi, China rose radish, Knezovich pumpkin and Thai White brinjal.
All the ingredients are used in The Palace’s luxurious eateries, adding beautiful bursts of flavours to their dishes. Chef Hanroe grows over 22 different varieties of tomatoes and 14 kinds of chillies amongst other fresh veggies like Chiaggia beetroot, Romanesco broccoli and Black Palm kale.
The garden uses an efficient water-saving system for watering crops —mist sprays and drip irrigation — so that water usage is maximised, not wasted. Having grown up on a farm, Chef Hanroe has natural green fingers and revels at working amongst his crops. For the moment, he tends to the garden on his off days, and he is also upskilling some members of staff who have shown an interest in the vegetable garden.
What better than to know your food is being prepared with the freshest, organic home grown ingredients?
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