Tomos Parry, formerly of Kitty Fisher’s, will open his first restaurant – Brat – in Shoreditch on St Patrick’s Day next month (17 March). His Welsh heritage and love of Basque cuisine and cooking methods influence the seasonal British food, which will be cooked over an open fire. Brat is a colloquial term for turbot, we are told, and not a reference to his celebrity client Brad Pitt…
Bookings for BRAT can be made from noon on Monday 26 February by contacting bookings@bratrestaurant.com.
Having visited Getaria, a Basque coastal town well known for its barbecues, Tomos was inspired by the relaxed approach to cooking. From his time at Climpson’s Arch in Hackney and subsequently Kitty Fisher’s in Mayfair, Tomos developed an understanding of the relationship between good food and fire. A relationship anyone who has ever wheeled the old Webber out on a sunny day knows is very important!
No doubt Brat will prove popular in Shoreditch and it sits nicely alongside Smoking Goat 2.0, another BBQ-focused offering (albeit a Thai one) which opened in Redchurch Street last month.
On the menu: Carmarthen Ham; Fresh cheese; Grilled baby peas and wood fire grilled breads, made using organic native heritage grain flour, sourced from one of the few remaining stoneground flour mills in Britain. This will be followed with more robust flavours such as Cedar Wood Sea trout with Jersey cream and river herbs; Slow grilled little Red Mullet; Turbot, lightly seasoned; wild mussel and cockle soup and Offal hot pot with laverbread and potatoes, loosely based on the Welsh national dish of Cawl.
The kitchen will work closely with farms such as Maerdy farm in South Wales to source and select for the restaurant, with one such dish using aged badger face welsh mountain ewes, which have been fattened on their endless grass hills, with the extra fat covering intensifying the flavour.
Tomos will be collaborating on the wine list with Keeling Andrew & Co, the new wine import company set up by the founders of Noble Rot. They will be focusing on an approachable list, with a few interesting wines from old cellars alongside a list of sherry’s they are beginning to bring into the country.
Guests will access the first-floor restaurant through an unassuming entrance. The original 1930s stairwell will lead guests upstairs into the dining room, which retains many original features including art deco wood panelling and large steel frame windows, flooding the room with natural light. An open kitchen with the wood ovens sits at the heart of the room, surrounded by a counter bar with high stools for guests to dine.
