Back in the (long distant) day when I was a student in Cardiff and Cathays was my drinking stomping ground, in between studying (barely) and my munitions factory (them Boers) and chimney sweeping jobs (not quite that old), the Flora pub rather stood out as a bastion of tradition as against the ever expanding “fun” pubs catering for student dickheads like me. It was what most people would call a proper boozer in those days, with food very much an after thought and said “food” being limited to salted (none of those exotic dry roasted ones) peanuts (from one of the supposedly racey – they weren’t –  reveal KP Nuts pull off pub boards that were de riquer back in those days), crisps and pork scratching (if you were lucky)!

It certainly wasn’t somewhere you would go to eat, although Brains Dark back in those days tended to need a knife and fork to consume, but times have changed (oh boy have they changed since I was a student – I mean a pint of beer was under a pound back then and we moaned about that) and the Flora is now regarded as somewhat of a bastion in terms of good “pub” food and certainly now caters for the student crowd (be mad not to in their location).

Whilst I somewhat mourn the loss of the old style split lip and sawdust “pint of Blood and Teeth at the Docker’s Fist‘ boozers of old (these days I would be the pretentious git that would get the cold hard “Slaughtered Lamb“ stare as I asked if they have any assytriko by the glass), I very much now have to eat when I drink booze (else I tend to fall over) so decent food in a pub for me is pretty much a must.

The menu at the rather revamped (from old) Flora certainly looks rather fine,

with a seeming focus on superior (carb heavy) pub grub that also operates to mop up the booze, with a bit of an inventive twist added for good measure. By no means your standard “pub grub” fare.

A recent(ish) extension of the kitchen hours to encompass lunch time

was the perfect excuse to get J, A and I across town for a visit (miles behind the cool kids, but I always get to these sort of places eventually).

I wanted a rather broadbrush approach to ordering, only discounting the quorn (which I won’t eat unless I am held down and it is applied by prison guards via a forced feeding tube), however, A doesn’t eat beef or chicken thighs (the weirdo) so as we were sort of sharing those options were mostly taken off the table.

First up was a Mexican inspires lamb flatbread (£10), enshewing the usual Taco format, with the lamb cooked low and slow barbacoa style

The lamb was beautifully tender, with a good flavour and a nice caramelised sweetness from the onions.

Both the mole and the accompanying xni pec (translates to dog’s nose, as it supposedly makes you sweat like a dog’s nose due to robust levels of chilli in the mix) were, however, missing punchiness, with a seeming lack of chillies in the mix. The xni pec was particularly absent in terms of the sweat inducing heat I had been anticipating (being more akin to a rather tame pico de gallo affair). The dish lacked the jalapeños that seemed to have been abundant on one Gourmet Gorro had a few weeks back.

Shame that, as with more robust spicing this dish could have been great.

Potato and paneer, with wild garlic, samosas (£7) had a crisp shell

and a pleasingly bountiful interior.

Again though (at least to me) they were a bit lacking in that robust alium hit you expect from the billed wild garlic and needed a tad more generosity on the seasoning front.

The dressing, billed as mild naga (chilli I assume) but more akin in flavour (but with much more liquidy) to a lime pickle, was outstanding with the full on zip of lime pickle without the overload you often get in the Indian restaurant iteration. If they bottled this stuff, I would put it on pretty much everything. Despite the naga in the name, chilli fiends will likely be a tad disappointed though as there wasn’t much heat here.

Chicken tenders (£8) had a beautifully crisp shell of panko,

which provided a bob on crunch, with the buttermilk marinade doing it duty in terms of tenderising the meat. I enjoyed the green curry Thai sauce, but both J and A felt it lacked bite and more of a spice hit was needed. We defaulted to the excellent lime pickle- esque dressing in terms of dunking these (killer combo that).

Onion bhajis (£7) had the requisite alium (perhaps a little lacking in the samosas)  hit and a very good flavour,

but were just a little on the dense side in terms of texture.

Whilst the cucumber heavy raita provided an element of refreshment, it would have benefited from a looser, more yoghurty, texture to compensate for the density of the bhajis. We again defaulted to the samosa dip for these and it worked very well.

A well seasoned kimchi infused rice cake (£7)

was the surprising star of the show.

The just on the right side of runny fried egg (with a decent puntilla frill and an  umami hit from the furikake sprinkled on the top) operating to lubricant the rice, which had the spicy tanginess of the kimchi bob on and a lovely long lasting umami flavour. Meatless, but by no means tasteless, this was the dish I would be most inclined to order next visit.

Salt and pepper chips (a very reasonable £2 when added as a side to a dish on the main menu, £4.50 solo)

had a decent (if not a triple cooked) crunch and a killer condiment in the form of a fried egg mayo. Work of genius this, with the fried egg adding an eggy extra richness to the mayo (mayo being the best condiment by a country mile for chips is a hill I am prepared to die on – ketchup can get in the bin).

Despite my protestations, J wanted the bean burger. I tried the “Why the fxck do you want that” approach (never works, but it is nearly always my initial approach in terms of dissuading J from going rogue when ordering) and then the “They have run out and only have the beef burger left” (I mean if you aren’t a veggie why would you order the bean burger over a dry aged ex diary beef burger) all to no avail.

As bean burgers go (not a particularly high bar in my world), it was pretty good

with a decent crunch to the exterior coating and well cooked and spiced interior, which lacked the ice hockey puck denseness that is the downfall of many a bean burger. J loved the halloumi (never been much enamored by its odd squeakiness, with it quite low down in my cheese pecking order) and sharp pickles (I did approve of the latter).

Not usually a huge fan of brioche as a burger bun (too sweet for meat), but it was actually quite beneficial to the bean.

On the booze front they have only on tap (rather than draft)  beers as far as I could see.

For a pub in Studentville the wine list wasn’t too bad

with me going for the Saffer chenin blanc (usually a good bet on the quality to price ratio) which was reduced to £6.50 for a 175ml glass as it was being taken off the list. Shame that as it is probably the best wine on there, with a nice juicy apple aroma and flavour to it.

The verdict

All in all I enjoyed the food here, which made for superior pub grub. The star of the show for me was the kimchi rice cake (closely followed by the chicken tenders), whereas I would put (even below the bean burger) the lamb flat bread (followed by the bhajis, killer dip though) as my least favourite dish. One had the spicing bob on, the other was underpowered and well all just a bit flat. In between, there were some  nicely flavoured dishes and a couple of dishes that I would regard as works in progress, with tweaks required (at least to J, A and my albeit jaded palates).

J was a bit more underwhelmed than me, but I think she choose badly in terms of the dishes (bean burger and samosas) that she focussed on.  Her view was I had bigged it up and thus made her expectations too high. As such, it was apparently my fault (it was and will be ever thus)!!!!!

On balance I would say pretty good, but  my palate could have done with certain dishes being a bit more robust on the spicing front.

The details

Address: 136 Cathays Terrace, Cathays, Cardiff, CF24 4HY

Online: Instagram @flora_cardiff_official