For those who fall in love with their villa and are in no rush to leave it - and who could blame them? - breakfast can be brought to you if your butler is notified the night before. With the many honeymooners who come here, the resort is used to guests who crave the solitude and space of island isolation.
Sheira generally prefers to have breakfast in the main dining area where ever we are staying. Here at Mnemba, Sheira and Zoe would head first to the open-plan dining pavilion: sand on the floor, no shoes required! The tables are nicely spread out to maintain that feeling of being tucked away on your own away from other guests. I would be pounding the sand on my morning runs, and would eat later back at our Banda. Sheira would arrange to have Kundi bring my coffee and fruit back there.
Our butler, Kundi, would bring out granola, muesli with yoghurt, muffins and a huge array of fruits. This would be followed with pancakes, eggs, bacon, sausages, you name it , and are prepared so tastefully by Judy back in the kitchen! It was astonishing to me to see how Mnemba Island could run a humming, three-course kitchen in the middle of nowhere. We never saw any deliveries - just fishermen arriving on the traditional dhau boats with the scales of the day’s catch gleaming in the sun…
The food at Mnemba has a more island, Tanzanian feel than a lot of the international cuisine we had sampled at the safari camps. Delicious, spicy finger food would be served in scooped out, local wooden platters, and of course the Pan-African cuisine features amazingly fresh fish and seafood.
They really take care of you food-wise: a huge blackboard tantalises you with the day’s menu, which you can tweak or customise by working with the butler. Sheira’s usual dietary restrictions were happily taken into consideration - e.g. they always used cornflour instead of breadcrumbs on the fried fish…
One standout feature: the ingredients were bursting with freshness and flavour, from the carrot and cumin soup and spicy tomato relishes on the side to crisp cabbage salad and pineapple sorbet. It was really memorable food, even something simple like a heaping plateful of salty chips was homemade and handcut. And you feel so lucky to eat lightly done jackfish tempura that you saw arrive by boat only an hour before!
Sheira loved the way the food was served on oversized white plates: another example of how they keep things very natural at Mnemba, but always with a classy, chic edge.
Pre-dinner drinks each night are welcomed at Mnemba. I am not sure what percentage of people follow through on this? We arrived at the outdoor bar pavilion our first evening, to meet the wonderful team of staff, and introduce ourselves to the other guests there. We were curious to see where people came from? All over is the answer to that. South Africa, USA, Brazil, Italy and of course us from Australia. The bar was wide open – no charge for drinks, and the mood so relaxed…the next few evenings we never made it for pre-dinner drinks. We had already become a little lazy by this time…and could not pull ourselves away from our Banda in time for drinks.
Again, although you can eat at your villa or in the outdoor dining pavilion, for us the best spot of all were the tables they set right under the stars on the beach, with the coral sand running through your toes. The sky is pitch black and free of ‘light pollution,’ so you can see a canopy of millions of stars that twinkle far more brightly; flaming torches are staked around the tables. It’s pure magic…
There are Tanzanian style dishes: coconut curries, banana cooked with meat, braised cabbage and fresh pineapple with honey - but these wonderful island flavours are always presented as the slightly refined version. There is a European influence too, with tomato Bruschetta and Carpaccio, or even Asian style prawns with rice.
We had a lovely meal just outside our own villa one night The staff came in the late afternoon to set up the table, chairs and lanterns, and ask you what sundowner drinks you’ll want.
The staff set up our dinner table between our daybed and our villa in a sheltered area with a light breeze. Again our butler, Kundi served us; this time we were able to engage him and find out more about the life of this lovely, gentle man. It was a beautiful spot for our chilled cucumber soup and chicken curry - I remember the rice pilaf was scattered with delicious nuts and seeds for texture. Zoe and I also enjoyed meringue for dessert, showing off the chef’s flair for going beyond simple tropical cuisine.
PLEASE NOTE: Children under 6 are not allowed in the bar at certain times.
