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I’m sitting in a large cedar barn in Wales about to enjoy a feast served by one of the country’s leading chefs. The menu is a celebration of local produce with a few Spanish additions thrown in: a medley of raw vegetables and house ferments; Mallorcan sobrassada; cockles and laverbread; sweetbread with leeks; calderata with lobster and velvet crabs, and Mallorcan ensaïmada with elderberries and pear for dessert.
It’s a roster of dishes that partly reflects our location at Fforest farm near the estuary town of Cardigan on the west Wales coast. But mostly it speaks to the culinary sensibilities of tonight’s Welsh guest chef Tomos Parry, founder of Michelin-starred Brat, Mountain and Brat x Climpson Arch in London (he’s also cooked for the Welsh rugby team). Parry grew up in Anglesey and moved to London from Cardiff. Today, he’s brought a team of 32 from his three restaurants to take part in a “Brat x Mountain x Fforest” weekend of eating and drinking culminating in tonight’s six-course meal. “Our teams are used to dealing with phenomenal produce,” he says. “But I wanted them to come and see for themselves. To interact with the farms and absorb the landscape. I knew this area would speak to them.”
Parry’s residence is testament to the quality of local produce, farmers, fishermen and growers that exists in this part of Wales. It also speaks to the vibrant dining scene that’s grown up in and around Cardigan over recent years. Among the catalysts for that has been Fforest, the 200-acre farm and forest retreat sandwiched between the river Teifi gorge and Teifi marshes nature reserve. Here accommodation ranges from lofts to geodesic domes; there’s a cedar-barrel sauna and nature spa, an onsite pub, vegetable garden and supper nights. The scent of firepits and wood burners fills the air.
Founders James Lynch and Sian Tucker went to art school in London. Tucker is a textiles designer. Lynch was a graphic designer before he started developing spaces for creatives in Shoreditch in the late 1980s and 1990s. Then “the city boys moved in” and they decided to move to west Wales with their four boys. Since launching Fforest in 2007, they’ve opened courtyard eatery Pizzatipi and riverside hotel Albion Aberteifi in Cardigan, and a beach shack in Aberporth called The Boy Ashore.
Similar pioneers have been coming to this part of the world since the 1970s – inspired by self-sufficiency advocate John Seymour’s vision of the “good life”. Among them were John and Patrice Savage-Onstwedder and Paula van Werkhoven, from the Netherlands, who bought Glynhynod Farm in 1981 and started making raw-milk cheese using a 500-year-old Gouda recipe. Now Caws Teifi is the most highly awarded artisan cheesemaker in Britain. “My parents are courageous,” says John and Patrice’s son Robert, who now runs the business with his brother John-James. Getting approval from the local authority was a challenge. “The inspectors walked into our dairy and my mum was wearing a woolly jumper, no hairnet and clogs. They said it wasn’t safe. My dad put up a fight and helped pave the way for a younger generation of cheesemakers.” As his father says: “One cannot survive down a bumpy lane in rural Ceredigion by producing mediocrity. The pursuit of excellence is written into our DNA.”
Among other acclaimed local makers are family-run Welsh real ale producer Mantle brewery; In the Welsh Wind distillery, which produces rum, gin and single-malt whisky; and mill and bakehouse Bara Menyn, which keeps a shop in Cardigan where the almond croissants have quite a following. On my visit special flavours included pistachio and raspberry, apple crumble, banoffee, caramel and chocolate, alongside classic almond.
Bara Menyn is run by poet and nature writer Jack Smylie Wild (his book Riverwise centres around the River Teifi) with his family. Smylie Wild got his start in food at Fforest. “It made me realise people want good food around here,” he says. “When we opened Bara Menyn in 2015, people thought we were crazy: ‘You can’t open a sourdough bakery in Cardigan: they do good bread in Aldi.’ Now people drive all the way from Aberystwyth.”
Crwst café, which was opened in 2018 by Osian and Catrin Jones, is a popular brunch spot down the road where signatures include seaweed hash browns and a large selection of homemade doughnuts. A few streets over is Yr Hen Printworks, which opened in 2021 and secured a Michelin Bib Gourmand in 2023 for its seasonal small plates sometimes featuring meat from the owner’s farm. “We push each other” is chef Chris Walker’s take on how the community raises standards and expectations.
Ed and Louise Sykes founded the hotel and restaurant Llys Meddyg in nearby Newport in 2003 and have noticed a similar shift. “Twenty years ago a good plate of food was about portion size,” says Ed. “Now [the quality of] what you’ve got on your plate is more important than volume.” They recently opened Sailors’ Safety at Pwllgwaelod Beach, which serves battered cod and chips and other pub classics to beachcombers, coastal walkers and Sunday lunchers.
On the way back to Cardigan, Templebar Café & Farm Shop in Nevern is run by Kirk and Jenny Sneade. They belong to a wave of young people moving back here post-pandemic in search of a different life. They keep animals, grow vegetables and make delicious cakes and sandwiches embraced by the locals. “Being part of a community [like this] makes you realise its importance,” says Jenny.
“I do think in countries that have a thriving food scene the food community isn’t based around chefs in city restaurants but the country, the locals and the land,” says Parry. “I always thought my cooking was soulful. But coming here I realise what real soul food is: cooking with produce from home at home. My wife is like, ‘You actually look happy here.’”
Tomos Parry’s next Brat x Mountain x Fforest supper club is 19-20 September; coldatnight.co.uk. Ajesh Patalay travelled as a guest of Fforest and Mountain
