The bistro
A set lunch that has been £24 for three years, a dinner menu rewritten every Wednesday, a Sunday roast that cannot be changed, a wine list written to the food, a back room with a door, and the producers who make all of it possible.
one
The set lunch: a choice of three starters, three mains and three puddings from the same kitchen as dinner, two courses for £24 or three for £29, in an hour if you ask. The best-value thing we do.
Two courses £24, three £29, Wednesday to Saturday from noon to 2:30.
two
The à la carte: eight starters, eight mains and six puddings, rewritten every Wednesday around what came in, with the producers named on the menu. Mains from £22; a six-course tasting menu on Fridays and Saturdays at £65.
Starters from £9, mains from £22, puddings £8.
three
Vale beef, Llanblethian lamb or a free-range chicken, with roast potatoes in dripping, a Yorkshire the size of your head, five vegetables and a jug of gravy, two courses £26. The forty covers go two weeks ahead.
Two courses £26, three £32; children two courses £12.
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Forty bottles chosen to go with what the kitchen cooks, a third of them under £35, a dozen by the glass, two from Welsh vineyards, and a manager who will steer you to the cheaper bottle if it is the better match.
By the glass from £6 at lunch and £7 at dinner.
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A panelled room at the back for eight to twelve with a fireplace, its own door off the courtyard and a set menu written for your party. No hire fee against a minimum spend; the whole restaurant on a Monday or Tuesday.
No hire fee.
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The lamb farm in Llanblethian, the beef from the Vale, the Gower fisherman, the two cheesemakers, the Tuesday market and the orchard. Fourteen producers this week, each named on the menu, most within thirty miles.
Most of the menu comes from within thirty miles; the fish from the Gower and Pembrokeshire boats, the cheese from Caerphilly and Carmarthen.
The kitchen
The menu is short because a kitchen of four can cook eight starters, eight mains and six puddings properly for forty people twice in an evening, and cannot cook twenty of each. Everything is made here from the deliveries: the stocks, the bread sauce, the faggots from the lamb, the ice cream, the oatcakes for the cheese. The pass is open so you can see it, and Sioned is on it most nights.
Forty covers, so Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays need a booking. Lunch is two courses for £24, Wednesday to Saturday. The back room seats twelve with no hire fee. The menu changes every Wednesday and is online by noon.
