His cool and practical demeanour has served him well over the latest series of Great British Menu but everyone who knows the kind of start chef Nathan Davies has had to 2022 would forgive him for a few air punches and pats on the back as he not only excels on the TV competition, but his nearly new Aberystwyth restaurant, SY23, has achieved not one but two Michelin accolades in its 2022 guide.
Opening SY23 back in 2019, Nathan is former sous chef at Ynyshir, has worked as a private chef in France and in restaurants across the UK and his winning starter featured on this week's grand end-of-the series banquet, a tribute to 100 years of British broadcasting. Then in February SY23 was named as 'Opening of the Year 2022' by the UK’s most prestigious restaurant guide one day and awarded a star the next. Read our review of his restaurant here.
But who is the man who blew the judges away with his Merlin-themed, Welsh lamb starter and constructs his own mini-coal BBQ while staying as calm as a champ on national TV? The dad-of-two talks about the "ride-or-die" phenomena of working in the kitchen of double Michelin starred Ynyshir, where he worked with his pal Gareth Ward, his brilliant year so far, what's next on the horizon and how his kids keep him grounded when watching him on telly.
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"It's been amazing," said the 31-year-old when asked about his achievements so far this year. "You open up the restaurant, the dreams and ambitions of being on TV, the awards and stuff. But the reality of it all happening, in your heart really, the chances are quite slim. We sort of surpassed what we wanted to do when we first opened and now it's gone way up, it's absolutely unbelievable.
"We've got to carry on and keep our feet on the ground, but we've got to enjoy it as well that's the main thing. But it's all come so quickly. We filmed the show last November, when it doesn't mean anything to anybody! And then it came to February and were expecting a nice month and we didn't know anything about the fact that Michelin were going to turn up and award us a star. And then when they turned up it was the same day (as GBM's Welsh heats started). I'm lost for words at how to explain that one?"
The Michelin team turned up to film with Nathan around midday and then the evening comes round - he's on BBC Two making the most intricate of dishes with thousands watching. But his success on the show has been under wraps for months and he's keen not to take all the credit for formulating the dishes, the ideas around each course and how they are presented. His fish course was set upon a gorgeous wooden map of Wales with a fish dish corresponding to each part of the coastline, remembering the TV show he watched growing up, Coast. The map itself was made by a local craftsman who Nathan explained his vision to and it just came together.
"It's been surreal because obviously for us, it's been unfolding behind the scenes slowly slowly," said Nathan, who lived near Cardigan as a child and trained in the local college before pursuing his career as a chef. "We filmed the regionals in November, finals in December and we sat on it for a couple of months knowing the results and knowing how we were going to do and really quite proud of how we did it. It's me there on the TV but it was us as a team that got it there and we took a lot of pride in it. Then we were sideswiped by the Michelin. We were thinking we knew all the secrets, that we'd done something nobody else knew about and then out of nowhere we get done!" he laughed. "I've got a fantastic team around me, I'll always surround myself with good people. They are the backbone of the restaurant and nothing would be possible without these guys."
Nathan says he and the team have kept a level head over the past six months and are carrying on what they were doing before they were lauded by Michelin - which makes sense as that's what got them to those heights in the first place. Nathan works to get his head around it, he's not sure when they came but he can be confident that he and his team were doing their best.
"It's weird," he continued. "You try your whole career to achieve your goal and when you get it, it's that one day they say you've achieved that goal...and you've been doing it already, it's mad."
SY23, which has three areas, a terrace and wine bar - the relaxed areas where you can have tapas and small plates and choose from their huge selection of wines, and then there's the fine dining restaurant upstairs, which carries the Michelin star, with just seven covers. It cooks most of its menu over an open fire and gets its ingredients from within the surrounding area of Aberystwyth.
Representing Aber with their fare in the venue, and on Great British Menu, is really important to Nathan. "When I think about going deep into things, I know this might sound crazy, but I don't think about it as Wales, I think about it as going for Aberystwyth," he said. "I bring that responsibility inwards. I'm going to represent my home town. I don't feel the pressure if the country, but I do feel the pressure of home, and representing friends and family and loyal customers.
"There are some amazing chefs across the whole of Wales, I'm not sure how they feel... Then when you get to the finals and you're up against all the other regions then it's a bit more like representing Wales. I don't feel it as a pressure, I feel it as a privilege."
Nathan also cites his calmness and confidence in the kitchen and cooking on TV to the amazing places he's worked during his career, including in Ynyshir, whose second Michelin star achievement made the announcement day even sweeter.
"I loved it at Ynyshir and when I left I left on good terms," said Nathan, who turned down a head chef position in Cardiff for more money to go to Ynyshir as chef de partie. "By the point I joined Ynyshir I'd been cooking for 10 years or so and I thought I'd finish off there and learn something very different. When I joined it was really under the radar with a few die-hard chefs in the kitchen who were really into it. It was chefs that really wanted to get stuck in.
"When I left I just wanted to do something different, a bit more casual, because I'd been so full-on for so long. But once you start cooking nice food is a bit of a drug and once you've had some of that you've wanted to keep going. So what was an idea about a casual, local restaurant spiralled out of control to what it is now!"
For now, the plans with SY23 are just keep pushing forward - maybe extend the opening days for the more relaxed areas and after the past busy few months, Nathan and his team deserve to simmer in their success. There's no chance of them getting too big for their boots with their TV appearances though, Nathan's two sons, that he shares with wife Hollie, make sure their dad's feet stay firmly planted on the ground.
"I like to watch it with the kids because they're a good leveller," he admitted. "My youngest who's three will sit there for a bit, have a good laugh and just go off and do his own thing and then the eldest, who's seven will take the mick out of me and it's good fun. They'll take the mick out of the things I've done or said, which is a really lovely thing to share with them."
You can catch up with Nathan on the Great British Menu on BBC iPlayer now. For more food & drink stories, sign up for our newsletter, here.
