Africa's first bread sommelier bakes a Cape recipe with roots in the 1600s
Ricardo Slawers won his German title with a thesis on mosbolletjies, the sweet grape-must loaf that sells out daily at La Motte.
Franschhoek — Ricardo Slawers, the 42-year-old master baker at La Motte Wine Estate in the Franschhoek Valley, is Africa's first official bread sommelier.
The National Bakers Academy in Weinheim, Germany, gave him the title after he submitted a thesis on a new recipe for mosbolletjies and baked a loaf for the examiners. He says the year of work was demanding because he was also running a short-staffed bakery. He began studying the trade at 18.
The mosbolletjie is a traditional South African loaf made with flour, fermented grape juice and aniseed or fennel. It traces back to the French Huguenots who settled at the Cape in 1688.
It is seasonal, made only during the grape harvest with must from winemaking. Fermentation takes longer than for other breads and the oven temperature is critical: too hot and it turns hard, too cold and it goes soggy. Batches are small and sell out every day. Leftovers dry into rusks.
Source: Africanews, November 2026.
