Chester-based tapas bar Porta has opened its latest branch in the former premises of TV chef Simon Rimmer’s well-known West Didsbury venue Greens, the veteran vegetarian restaurant which closed down earlier this year with debts of about £600,000. Founded by brothers Joe & Ben Wright, Porta also has branches in Altrincham and Salford, and wins […]
High-profile Cardiff chefs Tommy Heaney (right in photo) and Dave Killick have teamed up to launch a ‘nose-to-tail’ restaurant with Italian influences in the leafy central district of Pontcanna. The new venture, Ember, is directly opposite Tommy’s flagship, Heaneys. Originally from Crumlin near Belfast, Tommy made his reputation at the Great House in Bridgend before […]
A former Mersey ferry docked on the Liverpool waterfront is to open as restaurant, bar and events space Daffodil next week following a £3.5m makeover. Formerly MV Royal Daffodil, the ferry plied the route from Liverpool to the Wirral for more than 60 years and is now moored in Canning Dock, close to the Royal […]
Veteran celeb chef Aldo Zilli makes his return to the London restaurant scene next week with the launch on Tuesday (10 December) of Undercroft in Mayfair, a dramatic new dining venue set in the crypt of historic St George’s church off Hanover Square. The venue was heavily trailed earlier this year as the site where […]
Babbo, the former Mayfair Italian restaurant with footballing connections, completes its transfer to St John’s Wood next week, while its fellow glossy Italian Bocconcino opens a seafood spinoff in the Strand called Osteria del Mare (pictured). Launching on Monday, Osteria del Mare takes inspiration from the Tuscan coastal resort of Forte dei Marmi, with ex-Barrafina […]
Sardinian chef Achille Pinna is to open a new self-named restaurant by the entrance to Shepherd Market in Mayfair next week. Pinna is backed by prolific restaurateurs George Bukhov-Weinstein and Ilya Demichev, the duo behind Burger & Lobster and Goodman, who earlier this month launched Fantomas in Chelsea. Achille is a former executive chef at […]
Less than three months after closing his highly rated Islington restaurant 12:51, chef James Cochran is opening a new venture nearby – a ‘bistro pub’ called The Brave in a revamped Essex Road boozer. “We’re creating something really special here at The Brave,” says James. “Given all the love we received from locals when we closed […]
A new Lebanese restaurant from industry veteran Pierre Hobeika opened this week in Barnes – a part of southwest London with no other Middle Eastern cuisine available. Omm, meaning mother in Arabic, has taken over a generous corner site in White Hart Lane long occupied by local favourite Annie’s, and more recently by the short-lived Farmer’s […]
Two chefs who were part of the opening team at Stockport’s high-flying foodie hotspot Where The Light Gets In eight years ago have teamed up to launch their own restaurant and wine bar, Cantaloupe, in the Cheshire town. Josh Reed-Cooper and Mike Thomas stayed in touch while working their way through some of greater Manchester’s […]