Sparrow Italia, the spinoff of a large and glitzy Los Angeles restaurant, alights in Mayfair next week when it opens its doors on Tuesday 18 October in the Avery Row site formerly occupied by Mykonos-themed Onima. Sparrow was created last year by AJ McCloud, executive chef of hospitality company Noble 33. Born in Boston and […]

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Mexican-American actor Danny Trejo is planning to open a flagship taco restaurant in central London, followed by a succession of delivery-only ghost kitchens to open every three months. He has raised £775,000 of a £1million target in a crowdfunding campaign on Seedrs. The 78-year-old Trejo is a reformed junkie gangster who spent much of his […]

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South African-based affordable seafood brand Ocean Basket has opened its first UK branch in Bromley, southeast London, targeting the growing global appetite for fish and seafood. Peter ‘Fats’ Lazarides (pictured) and his brother George opened their first restaurant in Pretoria – more than 300 miles from the nearest coast – in 1995. There are now more […]

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A high-end hybrid Oriental restaurant combining Chinese and Japanese cuisines will open next month in the new Four Seasons hotel at Ten Trinity Square in the City of London. Mei Ume, a name bringing together the Chinese and Japanese words for “plum”, launches on June 9, joining star French chef Anne-Sophie Pic’s La Dame de Pic […]

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Fresh from the launch of Radici in Islington, Italian chef Francesco Mazzei has announced plans to open a third restaurant in the new Battersea Power Station development this summer. Fiume – Italian for river, in reference to the Thames-side location – will serve Italian classics under the day-to-day running of head chef Francesco Chiarelli, Mazzei’s fellow-Calabrian. There will be […]

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⦿ Jay Rayner of the Guardian reviewed Radici, the new Islington Italian from Francesco Mazzei of Sartoria in Mayfair and, before that, L’Anima in the City. “Taglierini, fagioli and pancetta. That’s ribbons of a thin tagliatelle-style pasta, white beans and bacon, in a dense, starchy broth of such intensity and such conviction, you could be forgiven for […]

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