THE LOST ART OF LOSING YOURSELF:
WALES 02: GARETH WARD, YNYSHIR
Tarrick, THE OUT’s chirpy delivery driver, takes me through my Land Rover Defender 110’s plethora of settings – ride height… sand… rock crawl. It reminds me of my Tag Heuer, whose dial says “Professional: 200 METERS” when the deepest it’s ever been is the shallow end of Shoreditch House. I won’t be needing all the Defender’s capabilities – in fact I’m not even insured for “rock crawling” – but it’s nice to know they’re there.
One thing that’s not in the manual is the new Defender’s ability to make you feel amazing. For such an imposing vehicle, it’s dead easy to drive. I stick it in D and feel like a G, resting my arm on the open window and cruising down the high street on the way to the M4 west. I’m above almost everything, and I imagine all those admiring glances are seeing me as a bristly-chinned explorer on his next mission, when all we’re doing is going to Wales to a nice restaurant.
But no ordinary restaurant… we were tipped off about Ynyshir by a previous Lost Art of Losing Yourself interviewee, the award-winning chef Galton Blackiston, who said Ynyshir is the best restaurant he’s been to in the last few years, and that its chef patron Gareth Ward is the UK’s most innovative. Not just for his food, but for his whole approach to what a two-Michelin starred restaurant should be like. White tablecloths and stuffy deferential service make way for live DJ sets and chefs serving the food themselves.
You don’t happen upon Ynyshir Restaurant and Rooms – you have to really want to get here. It’s tucked away in one of Wales’ most beautiful spots in the River Dyfi valley, six miles from the nearest small town, Machynlleth. As we rock up, the reception is bustling as a party of very cool young hipsters leaving after a night’s stay mingle with a wave of kagouled OAP birdwatchers trooping in demanding to use the toilet – they’ve mistaken Ynyshir for the local nature reserve. Amelia, Gareth’s partner in life and creative director in the business, politely directs them down the road (after letting them use the toilet).
Amelia leads us past the DJ booth, through to the kitchen – which is completely open. All the seats at the tables face it like a small theatre… which is what it is. As the website says: “Arrive with your mind open, ready for an incredible culinary experience with loud music and fire… Not suitable for an evening of business chat or that intimate first date.”
Gareth is hard to miss – his cropped bullet head is head and shoulders above everybody else in the kitchen. It’s his favourite place – he’s not really interested in TV or recipe book deals. As he says: “I’m not that person – I haven’t got the face for it! I wanna be in here, cooking and burning myself and tasting ingredients and trying every day to do something better.” We manage to coax him out onto Ynyshir’s fire pit area to discuss innovation and his two Michelin stars.
“We’ve basically gone ‘f**k it, we’re gonna do it our way’,’' he explains in his quickfire County Durham accent (he’s not Welsh, despite his name and daffodil tattoos). “We’re not gonna follow any rules, fashions or whatever, we’re just gonna do what we wanna do’. Things are changing. We’re having a huge effect on the industry – we’ve shown you can be one of the best restaurants in the world using the best ingredients, but you don’t have to have white tablecloths and formal service. Don’t be pressured into not doing something in case the Michelin Guide won’t like it. Who gives a f**k? They don’t pay your bills. They’re not in your kitchen cooking every day. You’ve got to do it the way that works for you.”
What works for Gareth is an Asian-inspired cuisine with his own inventive touches. “It’s the kind of food I love to eat – when me and Amelia have a day off together, we’re hitting those type of restaurants – Thai, Chinese, Indian, Japanese. I just love those flavours – salt, sweet, umami, hot food – so it made sense to try to recreate them.”
“My top tip? Apart from not dropping liquid nitrogen into hot oil? (Someone did that recently and it just exploded, sending hot oil everywhere!) My top tip is cook the food you want to cook, not what you think somebody else wants to eat. That’s a big thing.” He laughs: “A lot of chefs sit in their kitchen cooking, but they really want to go home and have some f**king dirty char siu pork or a Pot Noodle or something. We cook that food!”
But in order to innovate, “You’ve got to know how to cook,” says Gareth. “You get these kids who come in and they think they’re something special, but they’ve never cooked or worked in a hard kitchen before. They’re trying to recreate the wheel before they’ve made the original wheel.”
Gareth worked at Rutland’s Hambleton Hall for five years. “It’s like a mini version of Le Manoir. Everything’s done from scratch – whole animals coming in the whole time, preparing stocks that take three days to make. Every chef should go through a classical kitchen. I know how to cook something classically so I can then bend it.”
When the curtain comes up and Gareth’s cooking, music thumping, he’s in his zone. “I’m not talking to anyone really, I’m just cooking.” His £350, 30-course tasting menu is a five-hour experience. “Time just flies – service for me is over and done with in the blink of an eye. Sometimes I wake up and go, ‘God, we’re serving the desserts – where did the time go?’ It’s cos you’re loving it.”
Ynyshir’s charm comes from its authenticity: “You can always see something that’s forced,” says Gareth, “whereas this has a soul – a huge soul – because it’s been allowed to grow naturally.” And, like all authentic things, you can love it… or not. “If a customer comes in and doesn’t like it, that’s not my problem, it’s theirs, because it’s just not their thing. There’s nothing wrong with the food – if there was something wrong with it, it would be in the bin; we’d have missed that course. I feel zero pressure – we’re just having a great time doing what we want to do in our own way, putting our little stamp on the industry.”
We take a walk through the wildflower garden down to the car park, where Gareth and Amelia try the Defender for size (he’s the only person who makes it look small) and then he’s off – back into his kitchen to do what he loves.
