Southsea's Maya Latin American tapas bar to open new restaurant at former Wicks Bar and Grill in Knowle

Winchester City Council has approved a premises licence for the restaurant in South Square, Knowle.

REVIEW: Maya in Southsea

A council spokesperson said the licence was granted on May 16 with no objections from other authorities or the public.

The site was home to the former Wicks Bar and Grill which closed in December after the council restricted live music events due to noise complaints.

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Business director of Maya, Robert Lee said: ‘The food will be Latin American and it’s small plates so think tapas – but they’re slightly larger than traditional tapas.

‘We cook over charcoal – with this new place because we’ve got a bigger kitchen there’ll be a charcoal oven but I think there will be a few extra bits like smokers and things like that.

‘Cocktails are the main thing but we’ve also got a comprehensive wine menu.

‘In Knowle, we will be doing Sunday lunch, we don’t actually do that at Southsea but we feel Knowle has the potential to do that.

‘It will be a Maya-style Sunday lunch, we’re not going to do a standard roast, it’ll be within our concept. It won’t be completely Latin but there will be hints of it.

‘We’ve got to drop the ceiling, we’re losing some of the windows, we’ve got to insulate it and soundproof it because that was part of the issue before, creating too much noise – we’ll only have background music.

‘We’ve probably got 50 covers in Southsea but here we should have up to 70 but it will still have a bar area partly because there is nowhere else in Knowle to have a drink.

‘If someone’s coming from Fareham, they can come in for a drink before or come in for food and move to the bar after.

‘People can use it as a bar but it’s a restaurant, no-one’s going to drive over just for drinks.’

The Southsea branch of Maya is in Jubilee Terrace and has been open since December 2019.

It’s hoped the restaurant will welcome diners in September.