Midlands chef Jonny Mills and his wife Hannah Barr are opening a tiny, eight-seater restaurant called Sael in Birmingham next week – almost a year after the original launch date, following delays with the fitout of the venue in the Goodsyard next to Jewellery Quarter station.
Dinner will be served to guests around the kitchen counter at a single sitting, with a menu focused on hyper-seasonality and no-waste cooking, using mainly ingredients sourced from local farmers and foragers. A complementary drinks programme is led by Asher Beardsmore, previously of Birmingham restaurants Opheem and Tropea.
Jonny has worked at the Cross in Kenilworth and Mallory Court Country House Hotel & Spa in Warwickshire, and previously ran his own restaurant, the Tame Hare in Leamington Spa, until the pandemic. He has worked on the ideas behind Sael in a series of pop-ups over the past 18 months.
Dishes he has developed include turnip used to provide a raw, bitter crunch in a white crab tartlet, its roasted trimmings then steeped in a smoked dashi for poached cod. Whole lamb is broken down into belly, braised and served with preserved wild garlic; prime cuts paired with smoked offal sausage, and fat rendered into a post-dinner fudge.
Sael apparently takes its name from an Old English word for a gathering to celebrate the harvest. It is not connected to the London restaurant of the same name from Jason Atherton, which ran for almost two years in St James’s Market, behind Piccadilly Circus, before closing in June.
