Despite being distinctly Welsh, Mumbles’ Môr restaurant is full of eclectic influences. You might find Thai, Korean, Keralan or Japanese, but with a characteristically local heart within sight of the waves. Outside, it’s all elegant dark blue and gold; inside it’s intimate, with only 20 covers, a stylish mix of exposed brick and cosy banquettes, paintwork a rich teal or salmon.
We start with their whipped laverbread butter, a subtly-flavoured nod to the venue’s name. Môr by name, Môr by nature: it seems wrong not to indulge in a single plump oyster in red curry sauce. An easy to ruin combination, yet the sweet, briny flesh shines through winningly.
A skewer of grilled pork collar – an underused cut – is laced with a caramel of fish sauce and tamarind for a sticky, tangy start. Our other choice is a knockout: an instantly impressive flatbread with a generous slather of cod’s roe whipped into silkiness. A revelation, with a tare-cured egg yolk ready to ooze and the snap of pink pickled onions. All in all, a tremendous dish.
A thumb-thick whopper of a pork chop comes with a light, creamy massaman sauce flecked with tiny crisp Thai basil leaves for bright bursts of liquorice. “The very best local produce from sea and soil” promises their website, so what better than sea bass, landed that morning by a local boat? Dressed with lemon butter and capers, its skin is taut and crisp, the flesh flaking away beautifully.
A meal of quiet, polished pleasures, then, and it is no surprise to see Môr included in the new edition of the Good Food Guide. As a Cardiffian it is easy to feel a twinge of envy toward any locals: Môr is a restaurant Swansea can be proud of, and one worth the trip from anywhere across south Wales.
Môr, 620 Mumbles Rd, Swansea.
Info: 07932 385217 / here
words JONATHAN SWAIN
