Why New York’s hottest chefs are invading London, from Mayfair to Shoreditch

Hamish MacBain hails the food world’s new special relationship
Andrew nye
Hamish MacBain1 June 2017

With its historic connections to the Royal Family, afternoon tea and top hat and tailed doormen, Claridge’s could not be any more quintessentially London. It is perhaps the last place that you might expect to find a New York cocktail bar pop-up, even if said bar was voted No 1 in the world last year.

But that is exactly what is happening this August, as The Dead Rabbit — the Big Apple cocktail bar that has been causing a storm since opening in the financial district in 2013 — begins serving up the none-more-NYC likes of the ‘psycho killer’ (white cacao, banana liqueur, cacao nib-infused Campari, Irish whiskey and absinthe; named after the none-more-NYC Talking Heads song) to patrons of the capital’s most traditionally British hotel.

‘We love the juxtaposition,’ beams co-owner Sean Muldoon. His business partner, Jack McGarry, adds that what they are bringing is ‘attitude… Our concept is historic but we’ve adapted it with a young, dynamic team and high-standard cocktails. So The Dead Rabbit is different, not just for New York but worldwide.’

Talking of psychos, and killers, London will this month — just a three-minute Rolls-Royce (or yellow cab) ride away from Claridge’s — welcome its first branch of Dean & DeLuca, the super-high-end New York grocery favoured by Patrick Bateman and Hannibal Lecter, which makes Whole Foods look like Lidl by comparison (in one of its three New York branches, a pack of prime porterhouse steaks will set you back $225). Another three minutes from there, at Corrigan’s, you will find Dickie’s Bar, also opening in June, with cocktails by former Dead Rabbit mixologist Gregory Buda.

New York's gourmet grocer Dean & DeLuca, favourite of real-life celebrities and fictional serial killers, is to make its European debut in Mayfair as part of new UK expansion plans

Mayfair — London, it seems — is about to go mad for Manhattan. A few years back, there were long queues — or lines, as they say over there — round the block at the UK’s first Shake Shack in Covent Garden. In September last year, people were getting up at 5am to grab a cronut from Dominique Ansel’s Belgravia site. But this year it’s the turn of London’s more high-end, date night-friendly establishments to exhibit an overt New York influence.

In January, there was an SW1 spin-off of Nordic-inspired Midtown favourite Aquavit. A London outpost of Fatty Crab, known for its Malaysian-inspired seafood, is rumoured to be in the works — as well as not one but two new hotel and dining offerings involving Robert De Niro (the new Nobu in Shoreditch and later The Wellington in Covent Garden).

Sean Muldoon & Jack McGarry of The Dead Rabbit in New York
Jennifer Mitchell / Splash News

Perhaps most excitingly right now, there is Marcus Samuelsson’s Red Rooster, a modern-day Harlem institution that has served up its chicken, waffles and mac’n’cheese to the likes of Paul McCartney and the Obamas (who held a $30,000-a-plate fundraiser there), and which has just found a second home inside Michael Achenbaum’s The Curtain hotel and club. It has been hugely talked about, even if Samuelsson laughs — really laughs — at any notion of his name being connected to a ‘New York invasion’.

‘I do know about the British invasion of the music scene in America, which has been very good for American music,’ says Samuelsson. ‘If we can have just a tenth of that impact, we should just finish up and go home. I’ll take that any given day!’

He’s being modest, of course. Samuelsson — who was born in Ethiopia but raised in Sweden before moving to New York in the early 1990s — has done more than just franchise out the formula he has been successful with in Harlem. He’s had plenty of offers to open Red Roosters in various places — so why the capital? He says he chose east London because ‘Shoreditch and Harlem have similarities, in that there’s a little mystique there. You could have been to London 10 times and never been out east, just like you could have been to New York 10 times and never been to Harlem.’ He also notes that, as a child growing up in Gothenburg, London has always been his ‘first love as a city’.

Another draw is London’s rich diversity. Samuelsson believes that ‘one of the most important things as a chef is you have to be a good listener to what the neighbourhood is’, and so has spent a lot of time adapting his menu to fit with the area. He enthuses at length about the Indian, Persian and Jewish food he has been able to enjoy while he spends time here, and the street markets such as those in Borough. As such, while 50 per cent of the menu has a strong link with Harlem (‘because that’s important’), the other half is made up of dishes inspired by the eclectic local cuisine.

The chicken and waffles at Red Rooster

There’s also, clearly, a recognition among New York’s taste-makers that, increasingly, London is the primary global food and drink capital that can rival theirs. After all, The Dead Rabbit may be at the top, but London has the highest number of bars in the World’s 50 Best Bars list, with five entries in the top 10: the American Bar at the Savoy is No 2, Dandelyan is No 3, the Connaught Bar is No 4, with The Gibson at No 6 and Happiness Forgets at No 10. It also has plenty of restaurants in the World’s 50 Best, among them The Clove Club, The Ledbury and Dinner. ‘London is the No 1 city in the world for restaurants,’ says Philip Hamilton, CEO of Aquavit London. ‘I just knew that Aquavit would be greatly received here.’

At the same time, points out Daniel Boulud — the New York restaurateur who led the transatlantic charge when he opened Bar Boulud at the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park seven years ago — London has increasingly embraced the kind of relaxed approach to dining out that characterises New York’s scene. When he opened, he says, ‘the concept of an approachable, affordable bistro in Knightsbridge was kind of an oxymoron.’

James Lowe at the ever-popular Lyle’s on Shoreditch High Street — which will in July welcome Pam Yung, formerly of Brooklyn’s Semilla, for two nights as the latest NYC chef in its ongoing Guest Series — agrees. He spent some of his formative years (‘13 or 14 years ago’) working at Blue Hill in Greenwich Village and WD~50 with Wylie Dufresne in Manhattan, and says that the laid-back attitude over there had a direct influence on him when he opened his own spot. ‘WD~50 was a total game-changer for me,’ he says. ‘If you were doing a similar type of food in Europe at that time, it would be really over the top and fancy, with tonnes of unnecessary waiters and theatre. It was like, “Wow, they’ve absolutely nailed this incredible care and attention to detail with the food, but everything is relaxed and fun and enjoyable.”’ As well as Lyle’s, he cites the River Café in Hammersmith and the St John group as ‘understanding this ethos’.

Dominique Ansel’s legendary cronut

No wonder more and more New Yorkers want a piece of the action. As Jean-Georges Vongerichten, whose eponymous restaurant in the Trump Tower on Central Park West has won three Michelin stars and who is opening a London restaurant at the Connaught this summer, puts it: ‘New York chefs feel comfortable opening in London because the culture is so similar.’ The French-born, New York-based chef says his new spot in the hotel’s conservatory will have a neighbourhood feel, with ‘an approachable menu offering something for everyone at all times of the day, a comfortable setting and a great address’. There are plenty of the latter in London — if New York wants to help out with the former, that’s good news for all of us.

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