The London Restaurant Awards are reborn in 2008

The London Restaurant Awards are to return after an absence of more than three years, Caterer can reveal.

The relaunched event, which last took place on 4 April 2005, will be held at the Grosvenor House hotel on 1 September this year.

The awards were launched in 1996 by the flamboyant media entrepreneur Bruce Burgess.

The 2005 event, billed at the time as the Tio Pepe ITV London Restaurant Awards, was the ninth time the awards had taken place in 10 years.

The black-tie event for about 1,000 guests had been in limbo since Tio Pepe ended its sponsorship.

The 10th London Restaurant Awards, which this time are being underwritten by property investment group Aaim, will, as before, be judged by a panel of London critics, including Fay Maschler and Charles Campion of London's Evening Standard, Giles Coren of The Times, Jay Rayner of The Observer and Terry Durack of the Independent on Sunday.

Awards will be presented across 18 separate categories, including Restaurant of the Year, Outstanding London Chef and Best New Restaurant.

Henry Harris, now of Soho House, who won Best French Restaurant with Racine, in Knightsbridge, in 2005, said: "Anything that promotes the good work being done in London restaurants can only be a good thing. I'm glad to see them back."

Judge Rayner said: "I'm delighted the awards are returning. There are lots of good and worthy gongs out there, but these have an extra credibility to them because the restaurant critic judges have more experience of eating out in London than almost anybody else."

Campion added: "I think the fact that it's three years later is certainly a good thing for the judges as it allows us all to look at thing afresh."

E-mail your comments to Joe Warwick here.