The idea of a cafe/bistro type place, which sells decent wine and food, on my door step is rather appealing. Add a retail wine offering and you start to really pique my interest.

As a result the taking over of La Nouba in Llandaff (at the top of Pencisely Road) and it’s rebranding as Moura by people who include a wine merchant (Wicked Vintners) is in theory right up my street (well not far off the bottom of it).

The food offering is all day, including early evenings on Thursdays through to Saturdays, with an off licence selling a pretty decent selection of wines which are far from your usual, boring, suspects.

These on the shelf wines can be bought to take away or drink in (retail price plus a tenner corkage, which is very reasonable, in this day and age, if you drink them in).

Thoughtfully (for immediate consumption) a number of whites are available ready chilled.

The menu includes breakfast/brunch (the latter is just breakfast for the lazy/those who feel the need to substitute gin for the normal milk on their cornflakes) and a more restaurant feel starter and main course selection.

My first visit was for breakfast, with my choice the “Full Moura” (£11.50).

Very decent sized plate, which include all the usual suspects, a big disc of black pudding, hash browns and pancakes and maple syrup. Decent quality to it all with my only real quibbles being it could have been a tad hotter and the bacon and black pudding a touch crispier

I think pancakes and syrup as part of a breakfast plate is a bit of a room divider. Our Atlantic cousins love it, but I am not entirely convinced that a breakfast plate needs the addition of pancakes and syrup (whatever happened to fried, in lard, bread on a breakfast). Would have preferred to pay less and not have the pancakes, if I am honest. Same goes for the pot of baked beans (tinned baked beans generally have no place on a breakie plate or anywhere really, in my opinion, and shall be banned when I become Supreme Leader) that arrived with the plate.

Mrs. SF had the fruit compost with almonds, yoghurt and an almond croissant  (£6.95 all in with a tea or coffee included in that price)

Decent portion this, with no stinting on the fruit element. Again a slight quibble was the croissant being a touch overdone.

Coffees were very nice with my Americano (£2.95 – without milk, of course – personally don’t think it is an Americano if add milk) good and strong.

A second visit (for pre drinks prior to dinner in, the next door, Il Giglio) took us into their rather nice courtyard out the back

There is a decent drinks menu, with a few options by the glass, which looks to be pretty decent value.

The Vina del Ora rioja blanco retails at £10+ and is £18.95 on the list, the red Ams Tram Gram is £12 retail and £22 on the list and the Saffer fizz retails at around £14 and is on the list at just under £30. All are very fairly price and unusually low (for the UK) mark up wise.

We, however, wanted to try out their £10 corkage offer and picked what I know to be a very nice rioja reserva which is on the shelf for £15.00 (in itself a fair price). With  the £10 corkage, the all in price was a very pleasing £25 to drink in. You would be doing very well to get a bottle of that quality for anything like £25 in a hospitality establishment these days (see my Kindle post of the other week,). Talking probably £40 + in most places for a £15 retail bottle (and this wine is good value for that £15 price tag).

Lovely drop this with nice sweet, ripe, hedgerow fruits and a touch of smokiness on the nose . On the palate, there were oodles of cherry, plum and blackberries and a touch of oaky vanilla (that sat in the background, rather than dominating the fruit).

We enjoyed it so much that we glugged the bottle in double quick time and still had 30 + mins to kill.  Rude not to buy another bottle (there were 3 of us), so we did.

Whilst the menu has starters on it, there weren’t any of what I would call nibbles. We enquired about some olives, cheese or nuts with our wine and were told there was some nibbly stuff in the pipeline (intriguingly Malay, if I heard correctly). In the interim, there was the option of ordering a starter off the menu

or they could get the chef to rustle something up. We went for the latter, although I must admit the mushroom croquettes did tempt

What we got was a rather fine (and substantial) plate of pork belly cubes (crisp crackling top, well flavoured tender, meat and properly rendered down fat) on a crisp, nicely dressed, salad, with chunky croutons and a good aioli.

We were charged £8.50 for this and I was very happy with that. They were great with the wine.

A third visit was for lunch and Mrs. SF and I availed ourselves of the main course menu.

I am a sucker for a good cottage pie (even though it is not technically a pie) and even though it is quite a wintery dish (the menu does seems to be rather skewed that way) I decided (even though the fried chicken seriously tempted) that was what I was having pretty much instantly.

Pricing is quite ambitious, with my cottage pie £14.95, verging on restaurant price territory rather than your standard cafe prices. As such the quality needs to be pretty good in my view.

At first blush I was a little disappointed with the presentation and, in particular, the lack of a crispy top.

Once I dug in, however, I was more than happy.

The slow cooking (10 hours) of the beef had worked its magic, rendering it down so it became beautifully rich and tender, with a flavour packed gravy.  A good apportionment of meat to veggies (the latter not overcooked to mushiness) in the mix added to the pleasure. Despite the lack of a crispy top, the mash was smooth and well seasoned.

I think, for nigh on £15, the aesthetics and textural contrast of a crispy top should be there, but there is no denying this was big on flavour and very enjoyable.

Very pleasing cottage pie this, which would have been even lovelier with a glass of the rioja we had on our previous visit.

Quite a hearty dish that tee’d me up nicely for the riesling tasting I had later that day (more on that, probably, next week you lucky, lucky people).

Mrs. SF went for the breaded chicken with a celeriac remoulade (£13.50), having initially toyed with the burger. 

She enjoyed this, with it having a light (slightly uneven) but crispy and well seasoned coating and a juicy, well flavoured, interior. A squeeze of the lemon provided lifted it all nicely.  The remoulade was also nice, with a good crunch and a punchy, tangy, flavour to it.

Mrs. SF wanted some chips (£2.50) and I was happy to help her eat them

Decent enough French fries these. Crisp, but still with a fluffy interior and well seasoned. Not sure why they need to be in the funny mini wire basket thing, but that is just me.

Whilst not on the menu I did hear someone order a filled baguette so assume that is a cheaper lunch option.

With it being a mid – week lunch, we were not on the booze (tempting as it was) and they have an interesting array of soft drink (not just the usual soda suspects).

We both went for a karma lemonade and very pleasant it was too.

The verdict

Really like Moura, with a great booze selection (at very reasonable prices) and good food. The buy off the shelf and £10 corkage is a game changer for me in terms of a weekend drink (with such a good in – house selection to choose from).

The food is a little pricey if you compare it to a cafe, but this is more a bistro affair and for the most part I think the quality warrants the pricing.  Also worth bearing in mind that I think the booze here is cheap (compared to most places) and I have always maintained that I am more than happy to pay a bit more for food if the booze is more fairly priced (see Spain) than is the norm in the UK (as is the case here).

Few niggles for them to sort out, but it is still in the bedding down stage and I am sure these little issues will be ironed out.

As with Il Giglio, a good addition to the neighbourhood and I hope they both do well.

The details

Address: 6 Waungron Road, Llandaff, Cardiff, CF 5 2JJ.

Website: see details below, but it didn’t load last time tried 🤷‍♀️

Opening hours: