The hungry gap of ingredients, when winter veg runs out and spring’s produce has yet to come on stream, might not be until April, but as far as new restaurants go, January is always the bleak midwinter.
Still, while the giddy whirl of autumn launches opening in time for Christmas might have ground to a halt, there are rays of hope to brighten the January gloom: pasta in Marylebone, a bistro from arguably London’s foremost French chef and the reopening of the flagship of one of our brightest British talents, plus a pair of sushi joints for anyone clean-eating after Christmas.
There are five new restaurants below – eating in one a week should make the next 31 days easier to swallow.
Emilia’s Crafted Pasta Baker Street
A fourth branch for the fresh pasta specialists (and a first for the West End) on a well-known London street not well known for its restaurant offering (Royal China aside). Expect pasta freshly made and slow-dried every morning in a custom-made pasta-making station, with each shape specifically matched to its accompanying sauce: a four-hour slow-cooked bechamel and Bolognese sauce (made with Pasture for Life-certified grass-fed beef mince) clinging to egg pappardelle, say; there’s a kids’ menu, too. Sit at the chef’s counter to watch the pasta action or at one of the 80 or so other seats, both inside and out. Note there’s a soft launch from January 8-21 offering 50 per cent off food and drink.
Opens: January 8
215 Baker Street, NW1 6XE, emiliaspasta.com
Juno
The trend for tiny dining spaces (Sushi Kanesaka’s four-seater counter, House of Ming's private "love seats" for two) continues apace with this six-seat sushi counter on the first-floor of Notting Hill Gate Mexican-Japanese hybrid Los Mochis. “Tokyo meets Tulum” remains the culinary theme, with line-caught seafood imported daily to the UK; try not to think about the air miles clocked up by these flying fish and focus instead on the quality of seared Hokkaido scallops with caramelised fig and truffle goma. The 15-course omakase menu clocks in at £180; wash it all down with fine and rare tequilas from what is billed as the second-largest collection in Europe (there are wine and sake pairings too) and watch out for a Broadgate Los Mochis opening in spring.
Opens: January 11
2-4 Farmer Street, W8 7SN, losmochis.co.uk
Restaurant Story
It’s been a busy 12 months for chef Tom Sellers, launching Story Cellar in Covent Garden and Dovetale at the One Mayfair hotel, and now the debut restaurant which brought him fame and two Michelin stars is re-opening after an 11-month refurb to mark its 10-year anniversary. The big reveal in Story’s new chapter is a first-floor chef’s table overlooking the open kitchen, with space for 14 guests; there’s a new lounge up here too for pre- and post-meal drinks and views of the Shard from a balcony. For diners less bothered about getting up close and personal, the main dining room remains on the light-filled ground floor where there’s fun to be had trying to identify any trace of the building’s former life as a Victorian public lavatory.
Opens: January 12
199 Tooley Street, SE1 2JX, restaurantstory.co.uk
Freak Scene Sushi and Robata
Aussie chef Scott Hallsworth takes his Freak Scene concept south of the river after finding neighbourhood success in Parsons Green last spring. This Balham site will, at 80 covers, be about twice the size, with dining areas taking in a sushi bar, a heated and covered patio and a main ground-floor space. Hallsworth classics going back to the chef's Kurobuta days such as grilled hispi cabbage with beurre noisette, ponzu, dried miso and truffle will be joined by sushi along the lines of the SW6 Freak Scene's Singapore chilli crab transformed into a rice and seafood combo instead of a wonton bomb. There are grilled items from the robata oven, too, plus saké and cocktails in the downstairs lounge.
Opens: January 16
1 Ramsden Road, SW12 8QZ, freakscenerestaurants.com
Joséphine
After opening Brooklands on top of The Peninsula hotel and the Riviera-inspired Socca in Mayfair, Claude Bosi returns to home turf with this new Chelsea bistro down the Fulham Road from the chef’s two-Michelin-starred Bibendum. Joséphine, the first joint venture Bosi has opened with his wife Lucy, is named after the chef’s grandmother and inspired by the informal bouchons of Lyon, not least the one owned by his parents. Expect French bistro classics, regional Lyonnaise specialities, a daily plat du jour and, to drink, bouchon-style metre wine, with diners only paying for what they consume. Front-of-house will be overseen by another London hospitality stalwart, Will Smith, previously of Arbutus and Wild Honey.
Opens: January 30
315 Fulham Road, SW10 9QH, josephinebouchon.com
