The mind-blowing barbecue restaurant on the corner of a Welsh cul-de-sac

PICTURE this.

- KATHRYN WILLIAMS

Matt O'Brien runs the restaurant from his home

You've booked a seat at one of Wales' hottest dining experiences, you know it's in an unusual setting but as you weave your way around a Vale of Glamorgan neighbourhood, you're still thinking “where the hell am I going?”Then it becomes abundantly clear, thanks to the vintage US truck in the front garden complete with a smoker where the engine should be.

There’s no better introduction to what's to come - home-cooked food to the max, basically, because Matty’s BBQ Chop Shop is run out of owner Matt O’Brien’s childhood, and now family home.

The unusual setting plus Matty’s evident passion and eye-popping plates and meat pulls have taken the foodie and social media by storm, with visits from Saturday Kitchen’s Matt Tebbutt who dubbed his short rib a “need to try” dish.

His low and slow “cue-cooking” from his Penarth cul-de-sac has seen his supper clubs booked up almost a year in advance, with no dining options - where people book to go without knowing the menu - at his home available until after November this year.

“The first three months sold out, like in about three days,” said Matty on his auspicious start back in 2023. “That's when I thought, ‘OK, there's something big, I've got something here. I didn’t even have a smoker at that point. I was doing everything out my oven. With just a little chip tray.”

A former session drummer, Matty has worked at tattoo shops and for a local university, but nothing stoked his fire - pun absolutely intended - like his discovery of how much cooking and feeding people made him happy and gave him the reaction satisfaction that performing live did.

With 10 smokers and barbecues around his garden and a very supportive wife, Lowri, the 39-year-old dad-of-two tells me his love of food was always there but took hold when he explored the world while touring as a musician.