Chef William Drabble this week unveils a new restaurant inspired by his 19th-century predecessor at the St James’s Hotel & Club near Green Park. Francatelli replaces Seven Park Place, the highly rated restaurant he has run since 2009 – but which lost its Michelin star last year. Charles Elmé Francatelli, London-born of Italian extraction, trained under […]
Our weekly round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about up to 25 February 2024 ***** The Evening Standard Tashas, Battersea Jimi Famurewa confessed that it took a trip to Sydney in January to convince him of the attractions of the Antipodean brunch. “And now I have fallen pretty hard for Tashas — […]
A new Anglo-American steakhouse with rooftop dining opens in Clapham High Street next week – and promises “the best steaks in South London”. Franklin & Baines offers selection of grass-fed British steaks, dry-aged for a minimum of 28 days, ranging from a 200g hanger steak at £18.50 to a 700g tomahawk for two at £69 – all […]
Morchella, a new Mediterranean-inspired neighbourhood restaurant with a separate bar, opened this week in a former bank off Exmouth Market, from the team behind Perilla in Newington Green, Running the kitchen is chef Dan Fletcher (centre in photo), back in London after a stint at 28 Market Place in Somerset. A former finalist in TV’s […]
Endo at the Rotunda, possibly London’s top-performing restaurant, is to close down for a four-month refurb in mid-March while chef patron Endo Kazutoshi masterminds two new openings. The Yokohama-born third-generation sushi master opened his 11-seater flagship on top of the old BBC White City Television Centre five years ago. It has featured in the top […]
Hackney seafood superstar The Sea The Sea will cease trading in its current form at the end of March, pivoting to a new role hosting pop-ups and residencies with the departure of launch chef Leandro Carreira. Launched in summer 2021, the 14-seater chef’s table inside a Haggerston railway arch attracted rave reviews for its 11-course […]
A new restaurant and wine bar combining Japanese-influenced food with natural wines opens today (Wednesday 21 February) in a townhouse on the Deal seafront in Kent – with yoga and treatments also available upstairs. The Blue Pelican is the latest venture from Chris Hicks and Alex Bagner, husband-and-wife team behind The Rose boutique hotel and restaurant […]
Our weekly round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about up to 18 February 2024 ***** The Evening Standard Hainan House, Islington Jimi Famurewa was impressed by this “enormously likeable passion project” from “rookie restaurateur Sunny Wu”, who “seeks to illuminate the gastronomic tendencies of Hainan province for no other reason than the […]
Brothers Olly and Will Oakley have joined forces to launch a pair of revamped 17th-century village pubs with rooms on the fringes of the Cotswolds in Oxfordshire. The Harcourt Arms in Stanton Harcourt, near Witney, and the Plough in William Morris’s village of Kelmscott, near Lechlade, were acquired last year by ex-Wadworth executive Rupert Bagnall’s […]
A major upgrade to The Stafford Collection’s Ribble Valley star has been announced at the same time as the property has released the 2024 line-up for its phenomenally successful Obsession festival. A new single-storey ‘Pavilion’ is to be built in the grounds, to create a 48-cover ‘signature’ destination for Lisa Goodwin-Allen who took over from […]