Cardiff . Cheap Eats . Restaurants in Wales . Uncategorized

Lyalena Lounge, City Road, Cardiff: review

On December 14, 2025 by The Plate Licked Clean

Your starter for ten.

‘All the men want it…I don’t know why!

All the men love it. Women, they don’t seem so keen. But men? They always want it…’

We’ll find out soon enough what my server, the lovely Haja, was talking about.

And no, it’s not that.

Among City Road’s vape shops, barbers, peri peri joints and window displays of kunafa, there is some good eating. Some very good: some terrible, too, but luckily Lyalena is firmly in the former category, and with room to spare.

A late afternoon window seat for my first visit. Lyalena is one of those ‘restaurant and lounge’ hybrids which dot this stretch, but I’m here for shish, not shisha, and a lemon and mint juice while I’m at it.

Immediately, a reminder of the generosity of Middle Eastern hospitality. Complimentary marinated olives, pickled chillies, coleslaw arrive before the delicately built and seasoned lamb sambousek (samosas) arrive. When hospitality margins are being cut to the bone. It feels happily counterintuitive.

Covers of Miley Cyrus, The Weeknd and Maroon 5 even Shazam doesn’t recognise play as I settle in, but I already know what I’m having. I order on a tip from Simon Hogarth, and it turns out being the man behind standard-setting Porthcawl chicken sensation The Bone Cartel means he can spot a mean Cardiff mixed grill too. I’ll return the favour soon by showing him where to eat in Grangetown. (In a deep-fried poultry-based coincidence, I end up coming back a couple of weeks later with Tyler, of Cardiff’s much-missed Chronic Fried Chicken.)

I’m offered ketchup. Ah Cardiff, you never change, do you? I suppose I should be relieved they don’t feel obliged to do ‘half and half’, that hate crime against world food, so I either look like ‘that guy’ or people actually eat like this.

Either way, please stop it.

Considering there’s some of the area’s finest grill work nearby, Lyalena shouldn’t be embarrassed to be named in that company. (Nearby you’ll find the grill skill, bread to fall in love with and delicate mantu dumplings of Afghan Cuisine, the always-reliable Castello, and veteran Shaam Nights, which is probably due a revisit.)

It’s solid work, with chicken and lamb shish- the lamb with a lightly smoky crust- and gently perfumed rice. There’s plenty of it, too. The highlight? Undeniably the kofte, loosely moulded into shape, almost crumbly, yet rich and fatty and well seasoned. Order this. Even with all the miles under your correspondent’s belt, it’s undeniably impressive stuff.

But really, however good the chicken, you come to places like this on City Road for what they do with lamb, don’t you?

Which is where we started, and the answer to our opening teaser. How could I not order the lamb neck on my return, after that trailer from Haja?

With a dollop of stoutly garlicky sauce and a loose chilli paste, smoky and fruity, it is a lovely thing. It somehow looks like nothing so much as a meaty Yule log: marinated and steamed with onions, garlic, cinnamon, cumin and coriander, it comes as one piece, not as individual chops or a richly-marbled fillet. You’ll need to put in some effort.

Ok, it may be a bit off-putting for those who like to eat without being reminded of what’s about to happen. It might be A Bit Much for people who prefer to distance themselves as much as possible from the reality of meat consumption by shovelling shrink-wrapped lozenges of contextless protein into supermarket trolleys.

No, I’ve no closing insight to offer on the gendered battle lines drawn around this dish. Raises a few questions, though, doesn’t it? What I can tell you, is that it’s fabulous eating. To get the best out of it you will have to go ferreting and fossicking around, but if you’re prepared to pick and poke and winkle and delve under its light scattering of charred onions, sultanas and parsley, you will be rewarded with something memorable, something rich and sweet and tender.

The golden broth, jewelled with lamb fat, is something to be enjoyed at its hottest, sipped and savoured. Like so much that happens here, it is something to be lingered over on a road where the best places still don’t always get their due.

119-121 City Rd, Cardiff CF24 3BP

All day every day, until late, from 12