Tired of London’s limited supply of excellent Mexican food? Say no more. Coko Becker, former head chef at Annabel’s and 2 Michelin-starred restaurant Pujol, in Mexico City (currently 13th best on the globe, according to the World’s 50 Best restaurant awards), is taking over the kitchen at Michael Sager’s latest venture, Bar Bruno. On the menu, expect to find an array of light, zingy dishes such as Caesar tostadas, crab esquites (a mix of corn, crab, avocado and jalapeño), and mackerel ceviche with leche de tigre.
Robin Gill (Darby’s, Sorella) is the first chef to collaborate on a pizza for the monthly Dough Diaries at The Orange, the Pimlico Road gastropub overseen by group chef director Ben Tish. Gill’s creation, the PizzaG Sophia, pays homage to the women of Naples (because there is no higher compliment than having a pizza named after oneself) with fennel seed sausage, friarielli, ricotta and chilli oil, all finished with shaved pecorino and capers.
Adriana Cavita is bringing a taste of her eponymous Mexican restaurant to Ryan ‘Mr. Lyan’ Chetiyawardana’s cocktail bar, Seed Library, in Shoreditch. Paying homage to the traditional ingredients and cooking techniques employed by generations of Mexican cooks before her, on the menu you’ll find a mooli (daikon) ceviche tostada with pomegranate, avocado, lemon balm and habanero; chicken thigh skewers in an Axiote marinade with pickled onion and morita sauce; and a Baja fish taco with black garlic mayo cabbage slaw, anchovies and a Caesar dressing. Plus, master mixologist Chetiyawardana has also crafted a new cocktail, the ‘C.R.E.A.M margarita’ with tequila, strawberry cream, lime, Capreolus Perry Pear and coffee leaf.
Free ice cream at Dishoom
Summer (hopefully) is finally here, so celebrate the arrival of all-things alfresco with the pop-up ice-cream cart outside the Carnaby Street Dishoom. Everyone’s favourite no-bookings Indian is giving out free bowls of its signature Alphonso mango with ice-cream — candy-sweet fruit topped with a scoop of vanilla — until stocks run out.
London’s most fabulous Indonesian chef, Rahel Stephanie, is teaming up with the gang at Toba, for an epic Indonesian feast. The menu is still under wraps, but expect an array of regional home-style and street food specialities from the world’s largest archipelago, including from the team’s North Sumatran Batak roots.
Salt Beef Sundays at Studio Kitchen
Wilde’s Deli is bringing chef Ollie Gratter’s contemporary take on classic Jewish cooking to a canalside terrace in Islington for one last afternoon. Sandwiches include the “Straight Up”, featuring salt beef and spicy brown sauce on rye, and the Japanese-inspired “Blossom”, which sees a furikake bagel topped with sesame seeds and nori and filled with crispy butternut schnitzel, sour plums, salted egg yolk and miso schmear. Accompany with sides of sauerkraut slaw and fried pickles.
Hector’s x Anna Tobias
Café Deco founder Anna Tobias is popping up at Dalston wine bar Hector’s for a two-day residency. Tobias used to cook at the River Café, Rochelle Canteen and P. Franco among other places, so expect her lunch and dinner services to be an expression of the veg-forward Britalian the chef has made her own, plus the odd Serbian influence from her grandmother. By-the-glass wine pairings will come courtesy of the Hector’s cellar.
London Urban Wineries Day
For the first time ever, all four of London’s ‘urban wineries’ London Cru, Blackbook, Vagabond, and Renegade are coming together for a day in aid of PrideWide and the ADHD Foundation. Hosted by Aidy Smith, a leading advocate for diversity and inclusion in the wine industry, there’ll be an intimate winemaker’s lunch within the luscious gardens of Renegade winery, as well as a ‘walkabout tasting’ around the grounds in the evening.
Run, don’t walk: Bangladeshi-Italian chef Naz Hassan is bringing his eclectic, delectable cooking to Oranj wine bar for a flash. Previously on the pans at Pidgin, BiBi, Crispin, Clipstone, and Neo Bistro (RIP), this residency will see him cook with more freedom than ever before, serving fun, inventive dishes honouring his mixed heritage and travels further afield. We’ll be ordering the courgette flowers with paneer and courgette bhorta. and guinea fowl with vin jaune sauce and togarashi-roasted maitake mushrooms. How about you?
Want the Hauser & Wirth lifestyle but don’t have a Mount St Restaurant budget? The art gallery-cum-hospitality group’s Mayfair wine bar Farm Shop is launching a series of monthly tasting events, the first of which ties in with English Wine Week. The ticket price includes samplings of cheese, charcuterie and four English wines, with tutored tastings courtesy of wine manager Nobuko Okamura.
Maybe Sammy at The Dorchester
Sydney’s Maybe Sammy is taking up residence at the Vesper Bar at the Dorchester hotel, bringing some Aussie sunshine to the night of the summer solstice. The holder of the Best Bar in Australasia title for the fifth year running at The World’s 50 Best Bars awards, the six cocktails from Down Under will include a tropical coffee margarita and Bondi martini.
The Parakeet x Bouchon Racine
A four-hands dinner from chefs Ben Allen (The Parakeet) and Henry Harris (Bouchon Racine), with the evening’s food profits going to charity: 50 per cent to suicide prevention cause Papyrus, and the other half to MAP, a charity providing medical aid to Palestinians. Expect Allen’s modern European fire cooking alongside Harris’s trad French technique.
Can’t get to Côte d’Azur? Fret not! Head to the sunny Minuty Villa terrace at the Rosewood hotel for the wine brand’s 3 course vineyard feast, promising live music, indulgent grilled lamb rump in a basil and red wine jus, and plenty of chateau’s highly quaffable Provence rosé.
