Sonder
It’s the Spring of 2024 and I’ve come to Outpost Bar & Kitchen on Llandaff Road to sample an “essence of New York” for brunch. In short, I would be kind to label the experience as average.
The bananas on the pancakes somehow taste of onion, and the pastrami bagel is like a night with Matt Hancock: full of broken promises, limp, and disappointing.
During this same period, if you had logged into Instagram and scanned the reception to Outpost from the Cardiff blogger scene, you would see an avalanche of heart eye emojis and captions gushing about being “obsessed” with the food.
This is perhaps a wider issue surrounding the coverage of food in Cardiff - and many other cities for that matter - which is plagued by PR, invites, and ‘influencer’ culture. These accounts claim to care about the industry and love to stress the importance of supporting independents, yet accepting - quite literally - anything free that comes their way and proceeding to eulogise about it.
The Cardiff PR machine trundles its way through every bio containing ‘DM for invite/collabs’, comped meals, engagement farming, and describing any eastern continental restaurant as a hidden gem. Like Queen Street crack heads desperately seeking the next fix. There certainly is a place for PR/ads - especially in this day and age - but it is beginning to engulf the cities food coverage.
Then there’s the Tik Tok style videos of close up gurns whilst chewing food, claims of “have I just found the best burger in the UK?” and slow motion videos of cheese pulls. As one of the finest chefs in our city puts it:
“People who don’t know a bhaji from a bearnaise getting overexcited by cheese burgers makes me want to scratch my own eyes out.”
It all feels rather hollow and insincere.
Why is all of this relevant if the piece is titled ‘Sonder’? Well, Outpost lasted a little over 12-months, before a new chef took over the lease and re-opened as Sonder Bar & Bistro.
This time styled as a neighbourhood bistro, promising to “transition from casual daytime dining to long, relaxed evenings of dinner and drinks”. Chef Jake Lewis comes from the extremely successful Pasture and then Parallel. Jake brought along chefs Ethan and Josh, who made the switch from their previous employer. You might also recognise Ethan as the drummer from Cardiff based band Buzzard, Buzzard, Buzzard.
I have got tremendous respect for these guys. Over the Christmas period of 2023 I ate one of the finest meals in recent memory at Parallel when Jake was at the helm.
This netherworld region of Pontcanna/Canton is one of my favourite locations in Cardiff - with Ground Bakery, West Pizza, Slizza, and Chapter all within a close proximity.
It’s a Saturday night and there is a real buzz in the restaurant. The space is packed but tables are not crammed in so as to overwhelm guests. We’re seated at the bar by a host until our table is ready.
The menu at Sonder is extensive, creative, and ambitious. Meat sourced from Oriel Jones and fish is line caught from day boats in Cornwall. Specials are visible on the walls. Sonder have certainly nailed the “neighbourhood bistro” brief.
There’s a lot of very good things about this place. Including snacks we order as starters.
That quote I included earlier referenced getting overexcited about cheese burgers. Well these beef - flat iron and 40-day dry aged sirloin fat with a 35/65 fat to lean ratio - smash sliders with cheese, chimichurri, chicken salt shoestring fries and truffle (£8) have me so giddy that you could put dry twigs beneath my feet and they’d catch fire. I could happily have eaten multiple portions of them and would be willing to wager this is a common occurrence.
Dainty tuna tartare tacos (£9) arouse the palate with a spike of heat, and a burst of citrus.
Crispy chicken schnitzel is stuffed with nduja and scamorza cheese. Would love more filling, but who wouldn’t want more nduja? There are strips of fennel, capers, and chicory, an excellent basil and garlic pesto, plus lashings of Parmesan. A side of thin fries (£6) that are crisp and snappy seem an ideal companion. It’s a really good dish and at a decent price (£19).
Fillet of steak ‘tournedos’ appear to be a Sonder signature, and something I’ve seen doing the rounds on Instagram. Inspired by the Bistro classic Tournedos Rossini - a French dish of beef tournedos (round steaks cut from the thinner end of beef tenderloin) served on a crouton and topped with foie gras.
Sonder’s more ethical version consists of pulled Mexican spiced beef shin, braised with three types of dried chilli, a beef fat crout that has been dipped in beef dashi and toasted, eye of rolled sirloin fillet, and tempura onion rings tossed in chicken salt and malt vinegar powder. There’s also chimichurri and red wine jus.
The dish tastes perfectly fine. I can’t help but think it feels slightly like a gimmick, the stack reminiscent of the tater tot skewers that Outpost seemed intent on including on most plates. If my Instagram handle was ‘JakeEatsEverything’ or ‘JakeFoodie’ then no doubt I’d tell you it’s the best dish in Wales.
I’ll always get excited by a burnt Basque cheesecake (duh). These were similar to a recent experience at the excellent Caper and Cure in Bristol, and a major disappointment. The cheesecakes were overbaked and far too dense, plus to top it off, macerated by a ‘sticky Pedro Ximénez sauce’ which tasted like pure PX had been doused over. This was a real shame, because I’d seen a picture somewhere of Sonder’s Basque cheesecake not long after they opened. It looked magnificent.
In Cardiff, there seems to be a resistance when it comes to providing constructive criticism which will ultimately allow restaurants to improve. Sometimes it’s cruel to be kind. This is a new restaurant with bags of potential who are trying, and succeeding at doing something creative. I like Sonder, whilst feel there is scope to develop - which I have no doubt they will under the guidance of these extremely talented chefs.