Former Fat Duck group chef Matt Larcombe will tomorrow open his Wild Restaurant in Berkhamsted near Hemel Hempstead, offering a hyper-seasonal menu that celebrates regenerative farming and zero-waste principles. With its own farm close by, Wild will operate on a ‘closed-loop’ system in which produce is grown from seed and leftovers return from the kitchen […]
Rafael Cagali, the star chef behind Da Terra in Bethnal Green, has opened his first restaurant outside London – Maré in Hove (originally launched as Marea, from the Italian for ‘tide’, but rebranded to avoid confusion with another venue). Born in Brazil of Italian descent, Rafael combines his varied culinary influences to create a very distinctive […]
Classic Chelsea brasserie Le Colombier has announced it will cease trading at the end of the year, in a week which witnessed the closure of Pearly Queen in Shoreditch, Koyn in Mayfair and Café Below in the City. Lyon’s seafood specialist in Crouch End will also serve its final guests tomorrow (4 October) after six […]
Edinburgh chef/restaurateur Stuart Ralston will next week launch a Parisian-style wine bar called Vinette in Broughton Street on the edge of the capital city’s New Town. It is his first venture since the September closure of his flagship Aizle, whose name is preserved in Stuart’s newly branded Aizle Hospitality Group. Vinette, which he is opening […]
Our round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about in the week to 28th September 2025 The Guardian Brasserie Constance, Fulham Grace Dent had “easily the weirdest restaurant experience” of the last six months at a new venture its website presents as a pastoral riverside homage to the post-War cook, florist and potter […]
Chef-patron Robin Gill is to open a new all-day cafe and aperitivo spot called Bar Brasso next door to his flagship restaurant Darby’s, near the new US Embassy in Nine Elms. The space has been operated until recently as Darby’s Next Door, and will offer pastries and coffee in the morning, bigger dishes at lunchtime […]
A lavish Maltese-owned Japanese restaurant has opened in a Grade II-listed former bank in Marylebone. Converted at a reputed cost of £15million, it features a cocktail bar in what was the underground safety deposit vault. Aki – from ‘akitsu’, an old Japanese word for dragonfly – is a short walk from Oxford Circus in Cavendish Square. […]
Influential Liverpool chef Paul Askew and his son Harry have found a permanent home for Barnacle, their ‘Scouse brasserie’ – in a grand Grade II-listed building formerly occupied by the Royal School for the Blind in the city’s Georgian quarter. Named after Paul’s seafaring father, Captain ‘Barnacle Bill’ Askew, the restaurant champions produce grown on […]
Two London institutions combine next week with the opening of a new café from the St John stable at the London Review Bookshop, around the corner from the British Museum in Bloomsbury. Launching on Wednesday 1st October, the new venture replaces the London Review Cake Shop that has been sorely missed by regulars since closing […]
Our round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about in the week to 21st September 2025 London Standard Carbone, The Chancery Rosewood, Mayfair David Ellis suffered a “night of glitz, glamour and ennui” at the latest branch of a New York-based global group which is the headline restaurant of the swanky new Mayfair […]