Former MasterChef: the Professionals winner and leading Midlands chef Stuart Deeley launches a new restaurant next week at Mallory Court country house hotel outside Leamington Spa in Warwickshire. Birmingham-bred Stu, who won MasterChef in 2019, worked at Mallory Court early in his career after studying at Halesowen College. He has had roles at some of […]
Chef David Taylor is to double his footprint at Hampton Manor luxury hotel near Birmingham with the opening next week of restaurant Kynd, following his success with Grace & Savour on the same Warwickshire estate. Grace & Savour opened three years ago, quickly establishing itself as a Midlands powerhouse and rising to number 30 on […]

Chef-restaurateur Andreas Antona has put his landmark Birmingham restaurant Simpsons on the market to mark his retirement after half a century in the industry. Simpsons, set in a Georgian house in leafy Edgbaston, is for sale at £850,000. Andreas, now 67, founded the restaurant 31 years ago, setting a new standard for dining in the […]
Glynn Purnell has announced the shock closure of his high-achieving Birmingham restaurant Purnells – number two in the Harden’s 100 list of Britain’s best restaurants as recently as 2022. Known as ‘the Yummy Brummie’, Glynn pitched his flagship in the business quarter very much as a culinary expression of his native city. He had given no […]
One of London’s most heavily trailed openings of the year has been postponed indefinitely with the news this week that Brad Carter is no longer involved with the Undercroft project in Mayfair. Brad closed his hit Birmingham restaurant Carter’s of Mosley last year, and in April announced that he would open Undercroft in the crypt […]
The French-owned, fantasy Italian Big Mamma group is to open its first UK restaurant outside London in Birmingham, taking over the former Vinoteca site in the Paradise development on Chamberlain Square. La Bellezza, a 150-cover trattoria with a 25-seat terrace, launches later this year and follows Gloria (pictured), Jacuzzi, Circolo Popolare, Ave Mario and Carlotta, […]
A new restaurant opening in Moseley next month promises to serve the first authentic Afghan cuisine in Birmingham. Kabuli has taken over the former site of Greek-Cypriot souvlaki specialist Soufi, which closed after two years. Kabuli’s founder, Farhad Spinzar, was born and grew up in Kabul before moving to Birmingham in 2001. Missing his homeland, […]
Highly rated Birmingham chef Alex Claridge is to open an extravagantly named chef’s table restaurant in the city’s Jewellery Quarter – where he plans to charge guests less than half what he should to be profitable. Albatross Death Cult – a name inspired by Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Rime of the the Ancient Mariner – will offer a […]
Our round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about in the week up to 14th April 2024 The Evening Standard The Bear, Camberwell Jimi Famurewa was nonplussed by a revamped neighbourhood boozer that had been closed for six years before being rescued by Teddy Roberts and chef Joe Sharratt, formerly of Brixton hotspot […]
Our round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about in the week up to 7th April 2024 The Evening Standard The Shoap, Angel Jimi Famurewa thoroughly enjoyed himself at this “hybrid cafe, food shop and bar that bills itself as ‘London’s first Scottish deli’”, from Glaswegian former economist Gregg Boyd – a “brilliant … invigorating, […]