From a wine bar in Chelsea to a Chinese new year menu at Hutong to a few high profile openings in Covent Garden, read our guide to the new openings and restaurant news to have on your radar for February 2016.
Bar8 at GastroVino opens on Chelsea’s King’s Road
You can now find authentic Italian food and plenty of wine by the glass on Chelsea’s King’s Road. Bar8 at GastroVino, a collaboration between Italian spirits expert Giuseppe Gallo and Made in Italy group, opened in January bringing the best of Italian delicacies to London.
A gastro wine bar on the ground floor – GastroVino – offers a variety of 20 different wines by the glass with each glass representing a different region of Italy.
The wines will rotate every week, with five glasses per week, allowing customers to take a flavoursome journey across the country. Italian cicchetti will be served along with the wines.
Duende
Victor Garvey, co-founder of critically-acclaimed Bravas Tapas, is opening his first solo venture, Duende – a modern tapas restaurant in Covent Garden.
Translating loosely as ‘magic’, ‘spirit’ or ‘charm’, Duende is both the name and ethos of this new restaurant on Maiden Lane.
In a warm, welcoming informal room designed by Matteo Bianchi, diners will be able to watch the chefs preparing dishes such as cured salmon rulada, crispy sweet potato, red onion escabeche and wasabi alioli; foie gras crema Catalana; and Iberico pork belly with piquillo pepper glaze, in the open kitchen.
The menu will be complemented by an all-Spanish wine list, available by the glass and bottle.
Frenchie Covent Garden
The acclaimed Parisian restaurant from husband and wife team Greg and Marie Marchand is set to open in Covent Garden this month.
The menu will echo its Parisian counterpart, ‘with simple, generous yet precise dishes heavily influenced by Greg’s travels, experience in kitchens and his classical French training growing up in Nantes, north west France’
Chinese New Year at Hutong
On Monday 8th February, the Year of the Monkey will be welcomed with a special celebration dinner at Hutong.
The ‘Double Happiness’ Chinese New Year menu includes the prosperity inducing ‘lo Hei’ seafood salad, traditional dim sum and the signature Red Lantern soft shell crab and Crispy deboned lamb ribs amongst others.
Traditional Lion dancers will perform to ward off ‘nian’ or evil spirits, with Chinese musicians setting the ambiance and a Chinese calligrapher to write you a New Year message.
Detox Kitchen
Lily Simpson, founder of The Detox Kitchen, opened a new flagship deli in January in Fitzroy Place, Fitzrovia.
Set across two floors, the new deli is a salad and juice bar on the ground floor serving signature salads and green juices and an eat-in sharing menu of small plates and salads that are available from breakfast through to early supper.
The basement level houses a fully equipped fitness studio and yoga to high-intensity interval training sessions.
Oliver Maki
This month sees the UK launch of Oliver Maki in Soho, which has five restaurants already established internationally.
Located at 33 Dean Street in Soho, the 55 cover restaurant ‘will introduce Londoners to the brand’s award-winning creativity: combining Japanese tradition with global flavours and exciting textures, for contemporary dishes like no other’.
The Gibson
The Gibson is a new cocktail bar opening in Clerkenwell. The Gibson is ‘set to thrill discerning drinkers with its original creations, intimate shadowy ambience, glinting mirrors and patina of vintage silver’.
The 45-cover late-night bar is housed in a sympathetically re-styled, listed building with an Edwardian tiled façade.
Dickie Fitz
From working breakfasts through to leisurely lunches, catch-up dinners and after-work cocktails, Dickie Fitz will offer a contemporary menu with dishes inspired by the flavours and ingredients of the Pacific.
Created by Australian group executive chef Matt Robinson, the all-day restaurant will have ‘an approachable, stay-a-while vibe and casual friendly service.
Galley
Galley is a new seventy-cover, contemporary restaurant and bar in Islington. Chef Marcel Gryzb, formerly head chef at Aubin, has taken inspiration from the cooking styles and flavours of North Africa, Asia, South America and Europe.
The menu will include dishes such as hand dived in-shell Scottish scallops, carrot, cardamom puree and toasted hazelnuts; and yellowfin tuna tartare with mango, avocado and wasabi nori crisps .
For the weekends, Galley will offer a brunch menu featuring dishes such as Duck Benedict on toasted sourdough and Red mullet and crab brioche with mango chilli chutney.
Chinese New Year at Hakkasan
This Chinese New Year, Hakkasan will celebrate the Year of the Monkey with a limited edition menu created by Executive Head Chef Tong Chee Hwee.
Priced at £88.88 per person, the Chinese New Year menu will be available until 22nd February and will showcase dishes that will bring joy, luck and prosperity in 2016.
In keeping with the tradition for giving friends and family gifts during this period, diners will receive a specially designed Year of the Monkey coin to take away with them and will be invited to share their hopes for the coming year by writing their wishes on gold ribbons and hanging them on the tradition wishing tree.
Book your own personal chef with La Belle Assiette
La Belle Assiette is offering an alternative to crammed dining rooms and overpriced “special” menus this Valentine’s Day by giving diners the chance to hire their own personal chef for the occasion.
They promise a restaurant-quality meal in the comfort of your own home, prepared, served and cleared away by one of an extensive database of professional chefs.
Over 200 chefs are available to choose from on La Belle Assiette’s roster offering all types of cuisine from Nordic to Nepalese and menus can be easily customized for any dietary requirements.
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