Recently in New restaurant launches Category

Tom Kitchin, chef-proprietor of the Micheli-starred Kitchin in Edinburgh, receives fulsome praise from Jasper Gerard in The Daily Telegraph for scouring the Highlands for the best quality ingredients.

The result is an exceptionally well produced menu that is unashamedly Scottish, hardy rather than twirly, showcasing the influence of Kitchin's mentors Pierre Koffmann and Alain Ducasse.

Meanwhile Sicilian restaurant Mennula garners another rave review, with John Walsh in The Independent praising chef-patron Santino Busciglio's knack of combining his grandmother's recipes with new flavours.

In The Times Giles Coren takes up a new cause: that of the vegetarian diner. In his search for a restaurant that serves non-meat eaters with something that is inspiring and enticing, he comes up with a corker in Philip Howard's new restaurant, Kitchen W8 in London.

His counterpart at the Sunday Times, AA Gill, is equally impressed with Kitchen W8 saying that while the food isn't quite as immaculately pristine as The Square, it is far better than anything else you can eat in Kensington.

Jay Rayner, restaurant critic of The Observer, pays a visit to Polpo, a Venetian-style bacaro in London's Soho, and likes what he finds. He is impressed by the authentic bare brick walls and distressed painted wood and - apart from a couple of minor gripes - with the quality and the price of the food, which is served tapas-style.

Michelin-starred restaurateurs Anthony Demetre and Will Smith are to launch a new restaurant in the capital, Guide Girl can reveal.

The co-owners of the critically acclaimed Arbutus and Wild Honey restaurants are planning a third West End site.

The duo has just exchanged on a property in Covent Garden, with high end restaurant specialist Restaurant Property understood to have brokered the deal for the site off market.

The news comes after Demetre and Smith, who won the Independent Restaurateur of the Year Catey in 2008, shelved plans for a City restaurant last year.

After working together for nearly 10 years, Demetre and Smith launched their first solo venture Arbutus in Soho in May 2006 and it became an instant hit with the critics.

With Smith in charge of front of house and Demetre behind the stove, Arbutus gained universal praise for its competitive pricing policy, excellent food and its casual, non-tablecloth approach to fine dining. It scooped up a string of awards for best new restaurant and received a Michelin star in January 2007.

In July 2007, Demetre and Smith opened their second restaurant, Wild Honey in Mayfair, which quickly repeated the success of its predecessor garnering critical acclaim and a Michelin star just six months after opening.

Providing top quality food and service at affordable prices, it's great news for the London restaurant scene that Demetre and Smith are continuing to roll out their winning concept.

Anthony Demetre and Will Smith masterclass - 2008 Chef Conference 

Indian chef Atul Kochhar, chef-patron of the Michelin-starred Benares in London, has teamed up with restaurateur Carlo Spetale, owner of the First Restaurant Group, to launch a new venture in the capital.

Called Colony, the new restaurant will be modelled on the bars and clubs of the British Raj region in India and will open in Marylebone Village, west London, in February.

It will serve tapas style dishes inspired by Indian street food with Kochhar, who also runs Vatika on Hampshire's Wickham Vineyard, overseeing the menu.

What's the deal with entertainment-themed restaurants at the moment?

After the not quite good enough South African outfit Madame Zingara, which was forced to abandon its London outpost next to Battersea Power Station after it went bust, and the car crash that was Bel Canto, the UK offshoot of the Parisian restaurant which combines French food with opera-singing staff, one would've thought operators would think twice before throwing themselves into the abyss of amusement-led restaurants.

But as always, people don't seem to learn from other people's mistakes and recently there has been a string of entertainment-themed ventures hitting the capital.

There was the launch of the too-cool-for-school Blues Kitchen in Camden, the über-cheesy Proud Cabaret (in the former Bel Canto site) in the City, and Eurotrash flagship Supper Club which has made the move from Amsterdam to Notting Hill.

Now there's another. Circus, due to open in mid-January in Covent Garden, will be a surrealist-inspired venue designed by ex-Habitat creative director Tom Dixon, "with entertainment at its very heart".

To make things even more obscure (inline with its surrealist theme one imagines), is the fact that the entertainment is top secret. All that is revealed is that "the acts are guaranteed to entertain", which is reassuring since that's kind of the point of entertainment.

What ever happened to the concept of focusing a restaurant on the food?

 

It's not often that we get a story sold to us that leaves us lost for words.

But a new nightclub-cum-restaurant set to launch below Gilgamesh in Camden next spring has done just that.

Called Shaka Zulu, the £5.5m venue is a joint-venture between Camden Stables Market and Roger Payne, proprietor of The Cuban bar and restaurant in Camden and nightclub Sound on Leicester Square.

Spread over two floors, the 850-cover venue will be themed around Zulu culture from South Africa from the time of Shaka Zulu in the 19th century. Interiors will include £2m-worth of vast murals and wooden panels depicting Zulu culture as well as a 45ft bronze statue of Shaka himself presiding over the entrance.

The owners are even in contact with King Goodwill Zwelithini in South Africa to get things totally right.  

There will also be two South African themed restaurants: a fish restaurant offering seafood inspired by the Cape, as well as a grill restaurant serving speciality meats from South Africa.

"This is obviously a rather unique venture," concedes a spokesman.

"And we expect it to attract, apart from day to day clientele, a regular sprinkling of celebrities and movers and shakers."

I bet the Big Brother crowd will love it.

French chef Eric Chavot wants to launch an informal brasserie next year.

Chavot, who left his role of head chef at the two-Michelin-starred Capital after more than decade earlier this year, said he wants to launch a new venture that has "nothing to do with Michelin".

"It's still early days but I want to launch a more informal restaurant next year, a brasserie or bistrot de luxe," he said.

"I've spent my whole career cooking Michelin food and 22 years is enough - it's time for another life."

Chavot, who is looking for an investor to go into business with, added that the new venture would be a simple restaurant with a relaxed atmosphere but great service.

"It will be a restaurant version of Le Pain Quotidien and it will feature large tables and an open kitchen," he said.

Cornwall-based chef Nathan Outlaw has closed his Michelin-starred restaurant at the Marina Villa hotel in Fowey and will relocate it to the St Enodoc Hotel in Rock next year.

The move, which comes just months after the Marina Villa was put on the market, will see the chef reopen on 12 February at the St Enodoc Hotel where he also runs his more casual Seafood and Grill restaurant.

Outlaw, who opened his eponymous restaurant in 2007 and has been tipped by Michelin as a rising two-star chef for two consecutive years, told chef networking website Staff Canteen the move would give him more control of his business.

"Over the past six months I have been trying to put Restaurant Nathan Outlaw into a much more secure place from a business point of view, which would in turn allow my team and me to push our standards to a higher level," he said.

Indian chef-restaurateur Vineet Bhatia has won a Michelin star for his Rasoi by Vineet restaurant in Geneva, Switzerland.

The chef-proprietor of the Michelin-starred Rasoi Vineet Bhatia in London has won his second star for his venture at Geneva's Mandarin Oriental hotel, which he has run for two years.

The result sees Bhatia become only the second British chef (after Gordon Ramsay) to hold Michelin-stars in more than one country. He was the first Indian chef to gain a Michelin-star in 2001.

Bhatia said he was thrilled with the accolade. "We wanted to have a Michelin-star at this restaurant and are very proud to have won it," he said.

He added that he will launch a new restaurant in India next year.

Located at Mumbai's famous Oberoi Hotel, where Bhatia trained to become a chef 25 years ago, Zaffran will launch in early-January.

"The team from the hotel will be training with me in London for one month before we launch the new restaurant," Bhatia said.

"The menu will have to cater for the local Indian market, which is very different from London. There will be more intense flavours but the food will still bear my modern style."

Picture supplied by kaacha!!

So it was true after all. Following months of speculation and denial, Mandarin Oriental has finally confirmed that three-Michelin-starred French chef Daniel Boulud will open a restaurant at the luxury hotel.

The announcement follows that of fellow three-Michelin-starred chef Heston Blumenthal opening his first London restaurant at the Knightsbridge hotel next autumn.

Boulud will launch French restaurant Bar Boulud in the space of the former Grill restaurant of the luxury hotel. It will be modelled on the Bar Boulud in New York and will offer a French bistro menu with signature terrines and pâtés made on site under the direction of acclaimed charcutier Gilles Verot.

Located at street level with a separate entrance, the 165-seat restaurant's interiors will be developed by renowned designer Adam Tihany and will feature contemporary references to French wine making culture.

Interiors will include a bar lounge, red leather banquettes and chairs, a bar topped in zinc with a cork panel coating and an open kitchen as the focal point of the main dining space. There will also be a charcuterie bar featuring a glass counter displaying the restaurant's signature terrines and a selection of cheeses.

Tim Payne, head chef at Paradise by Way of Kensal Green, is leaving the west London restaurant to join forces with Masterchef presenter Gregg Wallace.

Wallace is setting up a greengrocer-cum-café concept in Putney together with former Elbow Room owner Justin Carter. The duo has bought the old Red's site on Upper Richmond Road and will relaunch it as Wallace & Co before Christmas.

Payne is understood to be joining Wallace & Co as executive chef after three years at Paradise.

He was executive chef for Marco Pierre White's restaurants for seven years and appeared alongside the fiery chef in his two series of ITV's Hell's Kitchen.

Payne also did a stint with Planet Hollywood founder Robert Earl and as consultant chef for Oliver Peyton's restaurants.

Wallace & Co will feature a range of branded grocery items as well as fresh fruit and vegetables supplied by Secretts Direct, owned by Wallace and business partner Vernon Mascarenhas.

Paradise is owned by Steven Ball and Riz Shaikh, the team behind other London gastropubs, the Old Queens Head in Islington, Queen Boadicea in Clerkenwell and the Westbury in Kilburn. The duo last month launched restaurant and live music venue the Blues Kitchen in Camden.