New York star Samuelsson to open in London

Hot New York chef Marcus Samuelsson is bringing his Scandified soulfood joint Red Rooster to London with a double opening in May.

Red Rooster Shoreditch will be in The Curtain hotel and members’s club, with the adjoining Rooster Taqueria serving Mexican-inspired breakfasts, tacos and cocktails.

Born in Ethiopia, Samuelsson was adopted by a Swedish family and grew up in Gothenburg. After training as a chef in Sweden, he moved to New York’s leading Scandinavian restaurant Aquavit in 1991, where he was promoted to executive chef at just 24. He was Barack Obama’s guest chef at his first state dinner in 2009, and opened Red Rooster in Harlem the next year.

Red Rooster’s soulfood classics include cornbread with honey butter, fried chicken with waffles, pork and shrimp rice, and “fried yardbird” with gravy, yams and collard greens. Swedish dishes include meatballs with bone marrow dumplings. New to the menu in Shoreditch will be herring with matjes, horseradish, fermented rice and pickled turnips, while the Taqueria menu will feature an Addis taco in a nod to Samuelsson’s Ethiopian roots.

Red Rooster will also have live music five nights a week, with a gospel brunch on Sundays.

 

 

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