The boozy base from which to explore Wales' exciting new food scene

Times

05-05-2025

Tom Watts-Jones had his first pint in the Hare & Hounds. The chef — since trained in lauded London restaurants — grew up in Aberthin, just outside the town of Cowbridge in the Vale of Glamorgan. The old drovers' inn he now owns was once his local. 'It used to do pickled eggs. And corned beef pasties on match days,' he says.
I thought of this while sitting in the pub's crisp white dining room, eating Watts-Jones's beef shin pappardelle, topped with a golden sourdough crumb from his own bakery. I thought of it again as my teeth broke his confit pork belly with a satisfying crunch, and as his house-churned ice cream oozed on my tongue. Everything on the menu — and I'd opted for the evening saver option, exceptional value at £30 for three courses — is made from scratch and even, when possible, picked from the pub's smallholding (hareandhoundsaberthin.com).
Safe to say that, while the Hare & Hounds' community soul has been retained under its present owner — 'I couldn't strip everything out, they'd attack me!' — the food scene has evolved. As it has across this overlooked chunk of Wales.
The Vale of Glamorgan is Wales's double chin, bulging into the Bristol Channel just west of Cardiff and south of the M4, easy to bypass en route to Pembrokeshire — unless you're a Gavin and Stacey fan on pilgrimage to Barry. But the hungry should also take the slip road at junction 34 of the M4.
With its rolling, fertile lowlands the Vale has always been an agricultural county. Recently it's become the surprising rising star of the Welsh food scene. Award-winners have popped up: the Hare & Hounds has long held a Bib Gourmand (the Michelin rating that recognises places that serve good food at moderate prices) and was joined in 2024 by Penarth's hip Touring Club restaurant. In 2022 Home, also in Penarth, won a Michelin star six months after opening (eight courses from £145pp; homeatpenarth.co.uk). There are also great producers doing interesting things, from coffee roasters and tea growers to a dozen or so vineyards including Llanerch, home to the UK's first vineyard hotel (opened 2019) and my base for an unlikely foodie mini-break.
A big plus of sleeping over was the chance to drink from Llanerch's cellar. Vicky Hamm, who guided a small group of us through a hugely entertaining tasting, was certainly keen for us to drink. She started by explaining how to properly assess a wine, from sniffing for faults — 'does it smell like wet carpet?' — to swirling and slurping. 'The wine wants to battle everything we've eaten, to enliven our taste buds,' Hamm said. 'The only way to help it is to drink more.'
I obliged, slurping gooseberry-ish dyffryn, earthy pinot noir sparkling rosé (unexpected, with a hint of tomato) and peppery red rondo. Hamm made us giggle while outside March vines, pruned to their nubbins, lined up like athletes on 'set', waiting for 'go'. Later, at dinner, I ignored usual pairing rules and ordered the pinot noir précoce with my whole roasted fish, on Hamm's earlier recommendation. No regrets.
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After day one I was fairly full but I knew how to work up an appetite again: a brisk dip in the Bristol Channel. Formed during Covid, the Dawnstalkers wild swim club meet daily, year round, at Penarth seafront, come hell or freezing water — and they welcome all comers. My alarm beeped horribly early and I had to scrape ice off my car but, soon after arriving, I was buoyed by the cheery group and the sort of peachy sunrise that makes you feel smug about having got up.
The water was speech-stealingly cold but undeniably invigorating. Fortunately Piotr Skoczylas soon turned up with his yellow cart, selling coffee and divine banana bread. For him, and I suspect many of the Dawnstalkers, this morning ritual isn't just about cold water wellness, it's about human connection.
It was still early so I headed off on a short walk along the Glamorgan coast, leaving Penarth's elegant pier behind. I strode out to Lavernock Point, a crumbling layer cake of cliffs and fossil-flecked pebbles where Marconi sent the world's first over-sea radio transmission. The morning sun dazzled, the air trilled with greenfinchs and linnets.
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By the time I returned to Penarth it was time for my second breakfast — a citron knude pastry at the cool Danish bakery Brod (£3.45; thedanishbakery.co.uk) — and a spin around this attractive town. My nose soon led me to the fromagerie Fauvette, whose owner, Jean-Marc Delys, was preparing platters. He sliced me a piece of hyper-seasonal la bouse, cut through with wild garlic (fauvette.co.uk). As I groaned over how good it was, I asked what made him open his cheese shop and tasting bar here. He'd initially thought about the Cotswolds but said, 'That's a bit done.' And, he added, 'There's something about this place.'
I lunched at the Touring Club, where the chef Mark Dowding makes a menu of on-trend small plates in the open kitchen, including a mean Welsh rarebit dripping with beery cheese (mains from £14; thetouring.club). I ate as much as my belt would allow before returning to my boozy base — not just Llanerch but Hensol Castle, only half a mile down the road. This restored turreted pile now has a craft distillery. You can learn to make your own gin or rum but I figured I'd leave that to the experts, preferring a tasting tour. The Welsh Dry was dangerous, smooth enough to drink neat (gin tour £25pp; hensolcastledistillery.com).
To help counterbalance all this consumption, I spent the next day walking one of the region's ten Vale Trails, which explore Glamorgan's coast and rural hinterland (visitthevale.com). The 6.5-mile Vale Trail 9 centres on the pretty market town of Cowbridge, following in the wake of the poet Iolo Morganwg (1747-1826), creator of the Welsh order of the bards. It was also a good foodie choice.
I ignored the 'historic' Costa Coffee (once Morganwg's bookshop) and got my fix instead at Watts-Jones's Hare & Hounds bakery. Then I added my own detour, heading west out of town to Forage Farm Shop, stocking up on Welsh cakes shaped like bottoms (£3.59; foragefarmshop.co.uk). A loop from here into the Penllyn Estate took me past happy far-roaming chickens and onto a wooded ridge, skirting Penllyn Castle. I couldn't see much but I could hear the banging: this is one of Wales's most ambitious amateur doer-uppers (just visit @mywelshcastle).
I wound back, eventually picking up the burbling River Thaw and emerging in St Hilary, once named Wales's best village by this newspaper. Well, it does have a fine old pub, the Bush Inn. And since 2021 it's had its own vineyard. I met the owner Liz Loch at her house and she led me onto the slopes behind where, almost accidentally, she and her husband Peter started growing grapes. Neighbours kept asking what they were going to do with their land and eventually, to shut them up, they said: plant a vineyard. It's small in scale, producing up to 5,000 bottles of natural, low-intervention wine a year (sthilaryvineyard.wales). They're open by appointment and as part of the Vale Food Trail, a celebration of local producers (May 25 to June 3; valefoodtrail.com).
Loch and I walked between her young vines, then she invited me into her kitchen for a taste of her rosé, all apples and summer berries, deep-pink but nicely dry. Not bad for accidental amateurs. I bought a bottle and carried it with me over St Hilary Down, around Cowbridge's edges and to my final stop: Aberthin's Hare & Hounds. A tasty ending but also pleasingly down-to-earth. I ate in the smart dining room but half the pub is still a proper old boozer, with well-worn benches and old rugby photos, featuring men who still prop up the bar. The Vale is a fertile, flourishing foodie destination, yes, but one with its feet still on the ground.Sarah Baxter was a guest of Llanerch Vineyard Hotel, which has room-only doubles from £120 and one-hour wine tastings from £25pp (llanerch.co.uk), and Visit the Vale (visitthevale.com)