A chef has been forced to close his debut venture, an ambitious sandwich shop on the edge of Manchester, after a single day’s trading after being overwhelmed by the sheer number of guests. Kieran O’Reilly launched Ruger Fjord in Lees near Oldham on Saturday, pitching it variously as a “focaccia lounge” and a “really good butty […]
Our round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about in the week up to 7th June 2026 The Guardian Bar Shrimp, Manchester Grace Dent nabbed “one of the best seats in Manchester right now, if not the entire north” at a new cocktails-and-seafood bar from the trio behind Higher Ground next door. And […]
Spencer Metzger (left in picture) opens his follow-up to the acclaimed Row on 5 next week – Chez Rose, a French bistro taking over the former premises of Little Social in Pollen Street, Mayfair. Like Row on 5, the new venue is part of Jason Atherton’s Social Restaurant Group. Jason (right in picture) shuttered Little Social […]
A bakery that morphs into a bistro and wine bar as day moves to night has opened in St John’s Wood High Street. No Forty Nine is from head chef Ella Williams (right – ex-Mountain and Crispin) and owner Jake Finn (left), who founded Cinder, a minute’s walk along the high street. Breakfast is served from […]
A rooftop food and entertainment venue featuring the largest retractable roof in UK hospitality and 12 independent kitchens opens in Newcastle city centre next week, on the upper storey of the former Debenham’s building in Eldon Square. Freight Island Newcastle – from the team behind Freight Island in Manchester – was due to launch last autumn but […]
Gary Maclean, Scotland’s National Chef, is to open a new restaurant called Kin in Edinburgh next week that celebrates the nation’s produce and culinary traditions. Seastoing 45 guests, Kin is part of The Roseate Edinburgh, a three-year-old boutique hotel converted from two Victorian townhouses on the capital’s West Side. Glasgow-born Gary made his name by […]
Carys Williams, aged 16, beat a field of 14,000 to win the Springboard FutureChef 2025 title, and is now mentored by leading Welsh chef James Sommerin (middle left) at his brilliant restaurant Home in Penarth. She is one of thousands guided into a career by Springboard UK, the charity whose mission is to help young […]
Born in New York and raised in Spain and France, Victor Garvey has been a chef since his mother sent him for work experience to a then little-known restaurant called El Bulli. This month, he is moving his Californian restaurant Sola from Soho, where it opened in 2019, to Westbourne Grove in Notting Hill – […]
Our round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about in the week up to 31st May 2026 The Guardian Skof, Manchester Grace Dent had to wait almost two years after its opening to bag a table at this “intensely relaxed yet still ferociously fancy” restaurant from former L’Enclume head chef Tom Barnes. Luckily it […]
Prolific chef Jackson Boxer launched his latest restaurant this week – Vesper in Exmouth Market, which he bills as his “tribute to London”. The venture takes its name – and possibly its colour palette – from Venus, the evening star. It occupies the former site of Taqueria, whose Notting Hill sister restaurant Jackson helped relaunch as Taq in […]
