As star chef Tommy Heaney gears up to take over Cardiff favourite Arbennig, he talks to Megan Thomas about his plans for the venue.
The only thing that could soften the blow of Arbennig shutting down in Pontcanna is the fact that it’s being replaced by Tommy Heaney’s new restaurant. Though sad to be leaving The Great House in Bridgend, Heaney believes that, if you’re going to do something, “you should be as involved as possible” – hence focusing his time and energy into this new venture in the Welsh capital. Thankfully, he regards cooking as not only his job, but his hobby. “It’s not just a job for me. I enjoy creating.”
The restaurant will be serving simple, good food without the frills or pretenses of fine dining. “We wanted to create an atmosphere where you could come any day of the week, not just special occasions. We wanted an environment where you just come in, wear what you want, sit down and have some nice food and a drink with a nice ambiance around you.” He’s not only interested in guaranteeing the satisfaction of his customers, but also his staff; he describes the 15/16-hour days he would work, six days a week, when he was starting out as a chef. “We don’t want a restaurant where our staff work 80 hours a week – that’s not what we’re about. We want our staff to have a work family balance.”
Heaney thinks this more relaxed type of dining is successful for a variety of reasons. He describes how he can go to a restaurant with his partner, Nikki, and look at the menu to find that he doesn’t want to take on a whole meal. It was whilst out with Nikki that the two ended up ordering five starters to share and deciding that this was the kind of thing they wanted at the restaurant. “We’ve stayed away from the three-course a la carte menu. We went for more sharing plates, small plates and things like that.”
The menu is seasonal, changing based on the availability of fresh produce and allowing the chef more room to experiment. “This is why we don’t actually write set menus – so that we can play about with different dishes every day.”
Heaney created a Kickstarter campaign online to raise funds and was blown away by its success, which resulted in an October opening for the new restaurant. Without support the restaurant probably wouldn’t be happening, he says. “I think it was great for local people who wanted to get involved. The fact we had support from big-name chefs helped a lot. It was a great opportunity for Cardiff to host these chefs coming down to cook.”
Before the opening, though, Heaney is due to compete on BBC2’s Great British Menu for Northern Ireland. Having done the show last year, he thought he’d have been more prepared, but he has “a completely different feeling than last year. I don’t know if expectations are maybe higher or what. But I’m excited.”
Heaney’s opens Wed 10 Oct, 6-10 Romilly Crescent, Cardiff. Info: twitter.com/cardiffheaneys