Conrad Gallagher was the youngest chef ever to win a Michelin star. That was in Dublin, when he was just 25 and cooking at Peacock Alley restaurant. More than a decade later, after a colourful and headline-hitting career that has taken him all over the world, why has he decided to base himself in Cape Town?

“The scene is on the move,” he says. “It reminds me of Sydney seven or eight years ago. And there are an awful lot of good restaurants popping up.

“Young South Africans who went overseas are coming back with bundles of experience, and then there are people like me who have decided we want to make this cosmopolitan seaside city our home.”

One of his first ventures in South Africa was to become group executive chef for Sun International’s restaurants and hotels, including the Atlantic restaurant in the Table Bay Hotel, though he doesn’t cook there. The Table Bay is one of Cape Town’s most gracious hotels, a haven of elegant calm on the busy V&A Waterfront. “The restaurant,” says Gallagher, “is old school: big old tables with armchairs and draped white tablecloths, fuzzy carpets and lots of candlelight.”

The tasting menu, six courses selected by the hotel’s executive chef, Dallas Orr, costs a staggeringly good-value £23 or £28 including suggested wines. (The Atlantic, Quay 6, V&A Waterfront, 00 27 214 065 688, www.suninternational.com).

When he’s not working for his hotel and restaurant consultancy, which takes him all over Africa and the Middle East, Gallagher can be found cooking in his Cape Town restaurant, the Geisha Wok and Noodle Bar.

“We launched Geisha just over a year ago, on December 15, 2007, in Mouille Point,” he explains. “And here’s a concrete example of the way the restaurant scene is booming here: exactly a year later, we found ourselves opening in bigger new premises at the five-star Cape Royale Hotel in Green Point.”

Geisha’s style is Asian fusion of an extremely high order, in an informal setting, though the new premises has more smaller tables and fewer long communal boards. It’s Asian tapas, dim sum, sushi, sashimi and noodles, all highly praised by local food writers and bloggers, on a menu that’s designed for sharing. The waiters advise that customers order as they go along, and when I ate there we loved the kobe beef sushi so much we ordered it again before moving on down the card. Dishes cost from about £2 to £8.

“The South African influence in the kitchen is not huge,” Gallagher concedes, “except, of course, for the enthusiasm and commitment of the local kids we have working there, including Handsome Ndlovu, who I think I’m right in saying is Cape Town’s — possibly the world’s — first Zulu sushi chef, who I’ve been training for the past three years.

“And, of course, there’s the local produce, particularly the excellent fish. Farmers are starting to grow Asian vegetables such as pak choi and shitake mushrooms and lemon grass, but ginger and chilli have long been part of the scene here, especially in the Malay curries.” (Geisha, 47 Main Road, Green Point, Cape Town, 00 27 214 390 533, www.geishawokandnoodlebar.com ).

Any advice for the visitor? “If you’re going out to eat in Cape Town, you’ll find the best restaurants in four different areas. There’s the Atlantic seaboard — the string of beach communities that runs around the coast — which is where you’ll find Geisha. The Waterfront has a huge selection of bars, cafes and restaurants. For a trendier edge, the Central Business District (CBD), which is being reclaimed from night-time no-go status, is the place to go. And in the winelands, upmarket homes nestle alongside vineyards and quietly confident established gourmet destinations.”

Here’s Gallagher’s pick of the city’s dining options:

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