I recently went for dinner with my family (in celebration of my sister’s birthday) at Cielo Restaurant. It's based at The Lakes Hotel in Benoni. The restaurant is Mediterranean style with a wide selection of tapas and platters. Cielo’s also offer breakfast, lunch and dinner menus.

Being a little late for the celebration, I skipped the starter and went straight for my main meal. But not before ordering a cocktail. The barman makes a mean Cosmopolitan ;-) For my main I chose the beef burger with plum tomato, red onion and greens which was accompanied by a side of hand cut potato fries. The menu boasts their homemade sesame bread buns. I enjoyed my burger and while the home ground beef patty was good, I was disappointed with the infamous “homemade bun” I'd been looking forward to. It was not freshly made and to be honest I found it quite dry. My thick hand cut potato fries however, were perfectly cooked with a crisp outside and deliciously seasoned. Some of the other meals ordered by my family included the fish and lamb dishes. Both looked good. I tried some of the fish dish which was quite a tasty portion of gurnard served in a creamy sauce with a subtle lemon bite. Beautiful sauce, pity the fish was slightly over cooked.

The service at Cielo's was fairly good. We were a rather large table and our waitress managed to keep up for the most part. The restaurant has a nice spacious layout. I'd recommend going during the day rather as it has a scenic view overlooking the lake with a holiday feel to it – seems a shame not to enjoy this along with a little sunshine and a cocktail or two ;-)