Gorse Cardiff

Perched on a south-facing Pontcanna corner, Gorse is quietly rewriting the script on ‘modern Welsh’ cookery. Forget the more obvious, sometimes forced nostalgia of rarebit and faggots - Tom Waters’s debut stands as a monument to the rugged Welsh landscape, honing in on local produce and wild ingredients.

The name is a nod to childhood journeys to Tenby, where roadsides blaze with yellow gorse flowers, but while its namesake is prickly and occasionally hazardous, Gorse is anything but. All smooth seafoam greens and earthy wood tones, the interiors could easily tip into Scandi cliché if not for the sly, tactile pleasures lurking around the 22-cover dining room - reflective metal coasters, elegant glassware, and a triptych of plaster-cast gorse flowers. It mirrors the concept: minimalist but comforting, with a menu that is essentially a seven-course study in restraint, precision, and holistic dining.

Case in point: we’re welcomed by native Welsh seaweed broth, served in a crackle-glazed cup that mimics the coarse beauty of sunshine-bleached barnacles. The broth is a clear, mushroom-spiked distillation; one sip and you’re on the coast, in a briny windblown fugue with salt on your lips. Wild mushrooms reappear later in a cornet canapé, sharpened by pickled juniper, while a rye cracker counterpart with roasted yeast cream and glistening pike perch roe lands with a jolt of saline funk.

A celeriac course arrives as a subtle perfumed puck, doused in buttermilk and mussel sauce flecked with chervil oil. Warm Parker House rolls, shapely as Kim K circa 2015, are a fluffy, butter-soaked highlight, while Welsh mountain mutton is tender and rich, its lingering gamey essence offset by a bright wild garlic puree.

Waters is putting Welsh produce under a magnifying glass. Stripping each dish down to the bare essentials demands balance. While a strawberry ice cream dessert veers into overly sweet territory, this subjective gripe is soon expunged by a fermented toasted oat llymru. A pudding made from sour oatmeal and husks, Llymru (also known as flummery), was once a cost-effective breakfast staple across Wales. But Waters’ interpretation arrives with a silky crème caramel quality and a nutty edge, complemented by intense, almost savoury topaz apple caramel.

Waters’ cooking is loaded with intent, emerging as an edible manifesto anchored in the collective Welsh memory, though never shackled by it. As Welsh traditions dissipate with every passing generation, Gorse feels both of its place and above it. If you’re passing through Cardiff with £95 to spare, you’d be hard-pressed to find a more rewarding way to spend it.

Gorse restaurant serves straightforward, flavour-packed dishes in a casual, laid-back setting with the very best Welsh produce. The first restaurant by South Wales-born Tom Waters, Gorse is inspired by the Welsh landscape as a whole, and aims to celebrate local growers, fishermen, and farmers. Beginning first as a pop-up, Gorse occupies a 24-cover restaurant in the Pontcanna, a historic farming settlement in the suburbs of Cardiff. 

Waters honed his craft at various top UK establishments, working under the acclaimed Welsh chef Bryn Williams, and Michelin-starred chef Phil Howard. He then spent three years at Heston Blumenthal’s The Fat Duck, before returning home to set up his own venture. 

The Gorse menu is not strictly traditional; it’s a dining experience that reflects both modernity and the regional culinary heritage, so rather than relying on the more obvious calling cards like rarebit and cawl, you'll find traditional Welsh ingredients and methods threaded through each dish. Fostering close relationships with local suppliers that embrace short supply chains and seasonality, the vast majority of ingredients are sourced in Wales according to either organic or biodynamic methods. The menu also highlights the wild food of the landscape; wild game, fish, seaweeds, and coastal vegetables which have historically formed the backbone of cuisine from the region. 

The lunch menu is served as four four-course menu, while the evening menus offer a seven- or ten-course tasting experience. Naturally, menus chance seasonally, but have previously included the likes of Pembrokeshire mackerel with horesradish, lovage, and apple; celeriac with laverbread, buttermilk and chervil; and a fish course with roasted monkfish, smoked pike perch roe and new season asparagus. There's also Gower Salt Marsh mutton with wild garlic and morel mushrooms, and a former Welsh staple called llymru - a fermented oat pudding which Waters' interprets as a creme caramel complimented by smoked raspberry jam and appl caramel.