⦿ September 27 will see the opening of Phil Howard’s new venture, Elystan Street, in the backstreets of Chelsea.
The site will be remembered by some as Tom Aikens – another chef who had a Michelin 2-star pedigree and struck out on his own in this quiet backwater, a short stroll from The Conran Shop and Bibendum (where Phil Howard worked many moons ago).
Well, not quite on his own. Phil Howard’s backer is Rebecca Mascarenhas, with whom he has collaborated with a good degree of success on Kensington W8 (more tokenistically as far as one can tell where it has come to revitalising Sonny’s).
The DNA of any restaurant partnership is a hard-to-put-your-finger-on-it kind of thing. The Square was the way it was because of Nigel Platts Martin’s input. Rebecca Mascarenhas has always been associated more with everyday dining than fine dining, and how she will influence a Phil Howard flagship as compared with a Phil Howard consultancy will be interesting to see.
It is striking that just as The Square is vaunting its lighter style of cooking under new exec chef Yu Sugimoto, the early PR for Elystan Street is talking of Phil Howard ditching the protein worshiping classic style of cuisine for a more Bruno Loubet-esque ‘flexitarian’ approach in which vegetables are brought more to the fore in each dish.
“It’s clear we all eat too much meat. The energy required to produce meat is huge. There will be less protein and dairy than at The Square — which are very needy on the planet”. Amen to that.
PRICES: Lunch menu: £42.50 for three (£35 for two courses) Dinner menu: Starters £16-£22 Main course £30-£40, Dessert £10-£12 Sunday lunch menu: £50 for three courses, including the ‘House Cocktail’
OPENING HOURS: Daily Lunch: Monday-Saturday 12.30pm-2.45pm; Sunday 12.30pm-3.15pm Daily Dinner: Monday-Thursday 6.30pm-10pm; Friday & Saturday 6.30pm-10.30pm; Sunday 6.30-9.30pm
CONTACT DETAILS: 43 Elystan Street, Chelsea, London SW3 3NT. Reservations: 020-7628 5005 or reservations@elystanstreet.com Nearest underground: South Kensington Website: www.elystanstreet.com Instagram/Twitter: @elystanstreet
