Season’s eatings: why Wales is a great destination for food lovers this winter

There’s an old Welsh farming tradition called hafod and hendre. The hafod (coming from the Welsh, haf meaning summer) was the house at the top of the mountain where the farmer and family would reside to graze sheep and raise new lambs during the spring and summer and allow crops to be grown lower down in the valley at the hendre (old home). Come winter, the farmer, family and flocks would move to the warmer valley floor. Families would dine on the produce they’d grown over the year and preserved, as well as fresh meat and foraged foodstuffs.

Winter was as much a time of great food as the other seasons in Wales – and thankfully, it still is. With Michelin meals, fantastic foraging opportunities, award-winning distilleries and vineyards and a host of gourmet markets, the winter months are some of the best to experience the Welsh food and drink scene. But why is Wales such a great destination for gourmets? Quite simply: môr a mynydd (sea and mountain). The Welsh coastline and mountain terrain offer a fresh larder of produce at all times of the year, even in winter.

The host with the coast
It’s from this natural larder that head chef Hywel Griffith sources most of his ingredients for the Beach House – a former coal shed-turned-Michelin-star restaurant perched on the sands of Oxwich Bay on the idyllic Gower peninsula. The ethos here is seasonal and local, meaning you can sit next to the expansive windows looking out to sea, dining on fish – perhaps bass or sewin (sea trout) – that was caught mere metres from you that morning. You can choose between three and eight seasonal courses, which, come autumn and winter, means favourites such as the famous Gower salt marsh lamb that’s reared just down the road.

It’s a similar tale at Nathan Davies’s SY23 in Aberystwyth. You might know Davies from his appearances on the Great British Menu and his over-fire cooking style, which is exactly what you can expect at the restaurant. All the main ingredients here are foraged either on the day, or when in season and then preserved, or farmed or fished locally, allowing you to feast on scallops with seaweed and burnt butter, turbot with cockles and broccoli, or Cox’s apples with wood sorrel and granola via a lunch or dinner tasting menu. If you can’t get a booking, or if the tasting menu is a little out of budget, try Y Sgwâr, SY23’s outdoor small plates restaurant. Covered and heated, it’s open for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and everything’s still cooked over fire.

Finders keepers
Talking of foraging, why not get out into the wilds for yourself and see what you can find for a feast of your own. The Severn estuary has been providing much-needed sustenance to locals since Roman times and was once famous for its lave net fishers. You can learn all about the estuary and its links to the life of Wales with Chloe Newcomb Hodgetts of Gourmet Gatherings. Newcomb Hodgetts, as well as being an expert in ecology and marine life, is a professional forager. Book on to the estuary, meadow and hedgerow forage experience and gather up to 30 different ingredients over 90 minutes.

Alternatively, head to the wild Brecon Beacons with Adele Nozedar of Brecon Beacons Foraging to learn all about sustainable sustenance in the mountains, moors and waterways of mid and east Wales, collecting everything from wild garlic to mushrooms. Look out for Nozedar’s gin botanicals experience, where you collect ingredients to flavour spirits.

Winter warmers
If you’d prefer just to taste the spirits rather than make them, you’re in luck, as Wales produces its own gins, rums, wines, whisky and even vermouth. The makers of world-famous Penderyn whisky opened a brand-new distillery in 2021 in the Old Board School in Llandudno. On a tour of the new site, you’ll get the lowdown on the distillery’s history, find out what’s currently being distilled, and hear about the original Brecon Beacons factory. You’ll also get to taste a dram or two.

Back down south, try Welsh ingredients with a Spanish twist at Asador 44 – an acclaimed, cosily intimate restaurant in the heart of Cardiff. Choose from slow-cooked Welsh lamb shoulder or Welsh bone-on sirloin to-share with seasonal vegetables cooked over the wood-fired grill, or perhaps treat yourself to a bottle of Ancre Hill Blanc de Noirs sparkling wine – grown and bottled just down the road in Monmouthshire.

Plant your feet
If you’re going meat-free, Cardiff has a host of vegan and vegetarian dining spots, and most restaurants in the city have a broad selection of plant-based bites, such as the oh-so-cool Hard Lines Coffee in Canton or the Vegetarian Food Studio. Just around the corner from Asador, you’ll find the famous Cardiff Market; pop upstairs to sample the baked delights of The Naked Vegan. This all-natural ingredient bakery is renowned for extraordinary vegan wedding and celebration cakes, but head to their stall on the balcony or the coffee shop on the ground floor for everything from vegan doughnuts and cakes to cookies. Or pick up fabulous plant-based loaves and pastries from Alex Gooch’s bakeries across the city (and soon to be opening in Monmouth).

You can’t leave Wales in wintertime without a tasty souvenir or two, which is the ideal excuse to visit one of the country’s other wonderful markets. Head to the famous Swansea Indoor Market and stock up on cockles and fresh-off-the-bakestone Welsh cakes, or stop by the newly refurbished Victorian market in Newport to grab bottles of Welsh wine, artisan loaves and Welsh cheeses such as Perl Wen and Snowdonia Black Bomber.

Find inspiration for your winter break at Visit Wales