Stevie Parle, the chef behind Pastaio and the now-closed JOY at Portobello Docks, is to open his long-awaited new restaurant on May 12. It will sit opposite the Gillian Lynne Theatre on Drury Lane, and is called Town.
Describing Town as “the biggest, most ambitious project I’ve ever done,” Parle is promising British ingredients cooked and presented simply, often with Italian influences. His team includes executive chef Olly Pierrepont (previously head chef of Luca and La Trompette), head chef Andy Bright, formerly of Kerridge’s Bar & Grill, and Zinzan Riess-Hollier, who also worked at Luca. Satan’s Whiskers owner Kevin Armstrong has also built the cocktail offering, focussing particularly on small-serve cocktails and lower ABV drinks.
The restaurant will open daily from noon till midnight for both lunch and supper, aside from Sunday when closing time will be 6pm and only lunch is served.
Starters will include day boat crudo with tomato water and Todoli grapefruit, asparagus with mangalitsa lardo and aged cherry vinegar, and Seasalter clams with sherry and butter. A charcoal grill will be used heavily for mains — things like Romney Marsh hogget with chianti and anchovy butter, Welsh lobster with lardo and XO, plenty of steaks — while there’ll be pudding like Morello cherry pie with homemade cherry stone ice cream, and zabaglione. Cheeses will come from the Lost Valley Dairy in Ireland, from Mike Parle and Darcie Mayland, Stevie’s brother and sister-in-law.
Ingredients and a sense of “doing things properly” will mark the opening. According to press material, Parle and his team say they are hoping “to pioneer a new kind of relationship with growers, by investing in and growing alongside farmers using progressive and regenerative approaches.”
Among these relationships is one with Andy Cato of Wildfarmed, the regenerative farming company most famous for its flour and bread. Town will be the first restaurant to serve Wildfarmed beef, from a herd of 100 per cent grass-fed shorthorn/angus cross cows raised in Oxfordshire. This beef will be used for the steaks on the grill, alongside snacks including potato bread with Wildfarmed beef dripping. The restaurant will rely on whole-carcass butchery, using every part of the cow.
Parle said of the opening: “Town is the biggest, most ambitious project I’ve ever done. We are helping to pioneer a genuinely new approach to restaurant supply chains, built on knowing every farmer who grows what we cook. A team of some of London’s most skilled cooks, great drinks, and slick and friendly service in a fun space, all designed to help you forget the day-to-day — and to remember how good things can be when food, music and good people come together in the right room.”
The project has been in the works since at least 2023, and will be Parle’s first launch since well before the pandemic, which saw the unfortunate closure of his restaurants Sardine, Palatino and Craft London.
Town will open at 26-29 Drury Lane, WC2B 5RL. For more information, follow @stevieparle
