Service Dining Rooms

09/10/2026

Charl and Fred got rather more than they bargained for today when a wonderful mushroom grower sent some mushrooms our way. A LOT of mushrooms! A great big mountainous, muscle-testing, mushroom mountain! 💪🏽🤣🥰🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

But what Charl and Fred gave up in muscle power, our clients will get back in delicious meals! 😋❤️

Mushrooms are on the menu for Monday… 🍄‍🟫 and Tuesday… 🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫and quite possibly Wednesday, too! 📅 🥰 🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

A huge thank you to our generous grower for this wonderful donation. You’ve certainly given our kitchen plenty to work with! 🙌❤️

09/10/2026

🍪🎂 A little extra sweetness, a few happy surprises, and lunch on the house were on the SDR menu today. ❤️

🌍 With tomorrow being World Homeless Day, our staff, with volunteers, Charl and Freddie, were busy all morning adding little touches to make things special for our clients. 🎁😊

The result was hundreds of Toppers Biscuit Snack Packs each sporting a World Homeless Day flag, and, for 16 lucky prize winners 🍰😋, there was a delicious slice of cake from Charly's Bakery. (Thank you Charly's! 💕)

We had a special visitor, too! 🐾 Ozzy came along with his human and waited ever so patiently in the office while she enjoyed lunch. Such good manners, Ozzy! 🐶❤️ We hope you'll visit us again, soon.

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30/09/2026

Remembering Terence 'Papa' Fick, whose funeral is tomorrow at St Mary's Cathedral.

24/09/2026

Die Burger's award-winning journalist, Willemien Brümmer, and photographer, Theo Jephta, recently spent time with us at the dining rooms. The story was published today on Netwerk24and will appear in Die Burger on Saturday.

Thank you, Willemien, for your thoughtful writing and, Theo, for your unique images.

(This link is to Netwerk24. There is a 7-day free access option.)

Distrik Ses is gesloop en apartheid het gekom en gegaan, maar die etos van die Service Dining Rooms in Kaapstad het dieselfde gebly, skryf Willemien Brümmer.

23/09/2026

✨ Miracles of all shapes and forms regularly make a welcome appearance at SDR. Today’s came in the form of a super-kind catering company that ensured that Braai Day arrived at the Dining Rooms! 🔥🇿🇦 Early this morning, they delivered delicious boerewors rolls for our clients to enjoy at lunchtime. And enjoy them, our clients did. All 325 of them!! 🌭😋

If that lovely miracle was not enough, another took the form of a generous supply of doughnuts, courtesy of a thoughtful restaurant in our hood. 🍩

Our huge thanks go to these generous sponsors for giving our clients a very special treat. ❤️ And to Hanri, and Isabella and Fred, today's wonderful crew of volunteers, thank you, and you, and you. 💙💜💚

21/09/2026

We had a moment of silence at the Dining Rooms today to remember our client, Papa, to whom Ikraam delivered a meal each day.

Papa, more formally Terence Fick, had long visited the Dining Rooms but, when it became too difficult for him to reach SDR, Ikraam saw to it that SDR reached him.

Our condolences to Papa’s family.

Now rest in peace, dear Papa.

16/09/2026

What a fun and energetic group joined us today from 💚 Old Mutual Green Hands Trust 💚. To Tania, Sharon, Lungi and Junaid, you much lightened our load and brought a fresh new energy, today. Do come back soon. If nothing else we need to ensure that the missing piece of Charly's Bakery blueberry 🫐 cheesecake 🍰 finds its rightful way back to you.

11/09/2026

Every weekday, close to 300 people, and sometimes 400, sit down to lunch at The Service Dining Rooms. Each one of those meals means a plate that has to be washed, afterwards.

Hard at work, here, is our Kitchen Manager, Nozuko Klaas. Plate after plate. 🍽️🍽️. After plate 🍽️. Rinse. Wash. Dry. Repeat. There's no glamour to the job, but there is plenty of care.

If you’d like to help keep those meals coming, a donation of any size helps us do just that. 💚

09/09/2026

🍑🐟🥫 How thoughtful is this?! ❤️

When SDR volunteer Jess Mackintosh, Auria Senior Living, and the wonderful residents of Woodside Village in Rondebosch get together to gather donations for The Service Dining Rooms, this is what happens! 🙌

We get canned peaches 🍑, pilchards 🐟, baked beans 🫘, corned beef 🥩, peas 🟢, lentils, jam 🍓, cooking oil 🫗, spaghetti 🍝, macaroni, sugar, maize meal 🌽...

Oh ..... and soup mix! 🥣

And peanut butter 🥜.

Oh. And there is rice, too!🍚

In other words, a whole lot of goodness will go straight towards helping us provide nutritious meals to people in need. ❤️

Thank you, Jess, Auria and the residents of Woodside Village. Your generosity makes a real difference, and we are very thankful. 🙏💚

08/09/2026

🌱🤝 If you're attending The Gathering on Friday, don't miss this discussion! 🎤

For if any organisation can show what becomes possible when business, civil society and communities work together, it's SA Harvest. 🌍❤️

Their thoughtful model, based on that of Australia's OzHarvest, has made a world of difference to countless South African lives. 🇿🇦🍎🥦

We're kinda proud to say that we were there at the start of the SA Harvest effort in Cape Town — in fact, we benefited from their very first Cape Town delivery! 🚚🥕🙌💚

🔗 Check out more on this link. 👇

This Friday, SA Harvest CEO Ozzy Nel will join some of South Africa’s leading voices at Daily Maverick’s The Gathering 2026: Cities Edition at the CTICC.

Ozzy will take part in the “Friends with Benefits” conversation, moderated by Stephen Grootes, alongside Denise van Huyssteen and Prof Bonang Mohale.

The question is an important one: Should business be helping to fix our cities, and what does meaningful investment in society really look like?

At SA Harvest, we see every day what becomes possible when business, civil society and communities stop operating in isolation.

Food exists. Logistics exists. Infrastructure exists. Skills exist. Extraordinary community organisations exist. The challenge is often not creating more. It is connecting what we already have.

We look forward to being part of this important conversation about the future of South Africa’s cities.