It is always interesting when a restaurant pivots away for its original MO and as such I was curious as to the changes wrought to the offering in terms of turning Thomas by Tom Simmons into Thomas, the brasserie.

In the purple patch dining wise (for Cardiff) that is Pontcanna/Canton, it is fair to say there is a lot of competition and in these trying times I imagine it is a hard fight to get bums on seats let alone to turn a decent profit.

I suspect the rationale for the new brasserie style menu is to mine a bigger seam of potential customers, but conversely you are arguably relocating into an even more competitive environment at that level. So more potential customers, but more competition for those customers and (perhaps, but not necessarily so) a lower margin from them.

The geek in me would love to see the books for Cardiff restaurants to see how the margins work at various levels.  To be honest I have no idea how any of them make any money at all on food (drinks are an entirely different matter) at standard prices let alone discounted ones (offers seem all rage this January).

This bought me to the revamped Thomas, the brasserie on a Tuesday lunch time to take a look at their new offering,

which includes daily specials (at a very alluring 50% discount at the time of my visit).

I was there for the Daily Specials, and the Special on my Tuesday visit was sausage and mash, although in theory the burger was also available (it had sold out so wasn’t in any event). Many may regard this as a rather down at heel dish as against the more fancy pants steak and chips, beef Wellington and chateaubriand specials on other days. I am, however, very partial to a good sausage and mash (onion gravy obligatory).

Interesting the sausage special is priced (normally, more on that later) at £20, which is quite punchy for sausage and mash and is the same price as the steak frites and the beef Wellington. Not sure I get the latter, to be honest.

My initial view was this needs to be a pretty darn good sausage and mash to warrant £20, but the menu description showed signs that it would be just that. References to baked mash and trotter jus suggested something a bit more than your standard sausage and mash. I must admit the reference to “jus” rather worried me as a proper onion gravy is the core of a good sausage and mash to my mind.

What arrived wasn’t the biggest,

with two quite truncated bangers. The quality was, however, definitely there with these being rather superior bangers, well cooked with a bronzed exterior and a juicy porky interior.

I think a good gravy really makes a sausage and mash dish and here that is exactly what it was and did.

Rich and glossy, with flavours infused from the trotters it was definitely a gravy rather than a jus (good thing too).

Well caramelised, sweet, onions added nicely to the mix and made for a very fine gravy to be mopped up by the mash.

Turning to the mash, I am very much in the Robuchon camp of mash can never have too much butter added to it and should be uber smooth, with nay a lump in sight (Mrs. SF inexplicably likes a lumpy mash).

Here the mash was buttery, well seasoned and beautifully smooth without having been over worked. Lot of time, butter and a deft touch required to get mash this good.

Drinks wise the obvious choice for sausage and mash would be a grenache based wine, such as a Cote du Rhone,

with the by the glass element of the wine list accomodating this.  It was, however, a Tuesday lunchtime so I was not drinking anything too boozy and thus defaulted to the “No and Low” elements of the drinks menu.

I ordered the panachè, which was perfectly nice for what was in effect a lager shandy. 

I did, however, think that the pricing (at £6 for a half) was a bit off as against that of the beers on the booze list

I find it more than a little odd that the Monte Carlo beer used in the panachè is £3.75 for a half and £7 for a pint, but when you cut it with (I assume) lemonade (basically a 50:50 split of  lager and lemonade, plus grenadine syrup if it is fancy pants, maketh a panachè), which is generally a cheaper ingredient, it suddenly becomes £6 for a half! Maybe I am missing something in terms of the pricing or is there is an added super premium ingredient (Louis Vuitton lemonade or is grenadine syrup very pricey?) perhaps, but at first blush the pricing is seemingly purely down to it having the fancy pants “panachè” (cocktail innit) moniker.

The verdict

I certainly enjoyed my sausage and mash and thought it good value for the 50% (in Jan and Feb) off of the £20 list price, with the total I paid including an automatically added service charge being £19.25, but I suspect some would question the value at the full £20 price (unless the portion size is increased). This is somewhat amplified by the fact that for the same price (on a different day) you can get a steak frites or a slice of beef Wellington and mash.

Not sure I understand why these are all priced the same when surely the ingredient costs of the Welly and steak frites would be (I assume, significantly) more than that of a couple of bangers (regardless of how good they are) and some mash. Is it the low and slow making of the trotter jus as against the wham baam cooking of steak frites that bumps it up, I wonder? If so, that logic doesn’t stand up when looking at the comparison as against the (hardly simple to make) Welly.

As such, as good as my sausage and mash was, I do find the pricing here a little confusing (same goes for the lager shandy/panachè as against a straight up beer). Perhaps it is my ignorance as to how restaurant pricing works, but I would wager most punters will be equally as confused as me to find sausage and mash (albeit a very good one) priced the same a slice of beef Wellington and mash.

On the specials front, I am also somewhat surprised by the inclusion of a sharing chicken curry dish. I am sure it would be very nice, but it seems a little out of step with the rest of the menu and (at £20 a head) the pricing seems a tad ambitious to me. If truth be told, if I fancied a chicken curry I don’t think Thomas, the brasserie would be my first choice.

I can see a lot of takers for the Monday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday Specials (basically the beef), but less so for the Tuesday, Thursday and Friday ones.

Regardless, it seems the 50% offer has been wildly successful (being extended out to February) so a bit of a marketing coup. I do wonder if demand will hold up in the case of some of the specials when the full prices kick in.

Details

Address: 3- 5 Pontcanna Street, Pontcanna, Cardiff, CF11 9HQ

Website: https://www.thomas-pontcanna.co.uk/