Our summary of what the national and local restaurant critics were writing about in the week ending 26 February 2023. ***** The Guardian Grace Dent dropped in to Beckford Canteen in Bath on “only the second official day of service” – “a time when no chef wants to see a restaurant critic” but she’d been […]
Leading Birmingham chef Glynn Purnell has opened a tapas bar a street away from his flagship, Purnell’s, in the city’s business district. Plates by Purnell’s occupies the former site of Spanish restaurant Pinchos on Edmund Street. Last year Glynn, aka ‘the Yummy Brummie’, opened The Mount pub in Henley-on-Arden, his first venture outside the Birmingham, […]
Indonesian restaurant Toba opened this week in St James’s Market just off Piccadilly Circus from Pino Edward Sinaga, a former manager at the Chiltern Fire House and Annabel’s, Richard Caring’s private members club in Mayfair. The move into London’s West End marks a significant step up for Pino, who has operated a street-food outfit called […]
Well-known Brighton chefs Isaac Barlett-Copeland and Dave Marrow (right and left in photo) are to open a wood-fire restaurant called Embers in the seaside town’s historic Lanes in early April. Embers will focus on Sussex produce cooked in medieval-style in a metal cage suspended above a fire in the centre of the restaurant. Isaac has […]
Veteran New York-based sushi master Masayoshi Takayama is the latest superstar chef who has agreed to launch an outpost at big-spending Harrods in Knightsbridge. Born into a family that ran a fish shop, Masa did an eight-year apprenticeship in Tokyo’s smart Ginza shopping district before heading to Los Angeles, where his restaurant helped popularise sushi […]
Former Hedone head chef Lee Skeet is launching an oyster bar in Cardiff’s city centre this weekend, ahead of moving his tasting-menu restaurant Cora into the same venue next month. The oyster bar, Jackson’s, will be on the ground floor of the Duke Street Arcade, near Cardiff Castle, with the tiny 10-seat Cora upstairs. Cora […]
Our summary of what the national and local restaurant critics were writing about in the week ending 19 February 2023. The Observer “Inventive, geeky and superb.” Jay Rayner visited Matsudai Ramen, the “first dedicated ramen shop in Wales”, which arrived in Cardiff late last year, from an “unexpected source” James Chant, “a one-time musician, tour […]
A new Italian restaurant has opened at the bottom of the City of London’s distinctive 20 Fenchurch Street building, better known as the Walkie-Talkie Tower. Larch is the little (and much lower) sister of the tower’s Fenchurch Restaurant, on the 37th floor, and Darwin Brasserie on the 36th – both of which achieve strong scores and […]
The historic Islington pie and mash shop M. Manze in Chapel Market is to reopen as a low-intervention wine bar serving British small plates by Alex Pashby of street-food trader The Beefsteaks. The pie, mash and jellied eels shop closed down in 2019 after 108 years in the face of steep increases in rent and […]
Highly rated Greater Manchester pasta specialist Sugo has changed its name to Sud following a long-running dispute with a Glasgow restaurant of the same name. Founded in Altrincham in 2015 by brothers Alex and Michael de Martiis (pictured left and right), the venture now has branches in Sale and Ancoats – the latter hailed for its […]
