Latest London restaurant openings: June

Taberna do Mercado

Having only been open a few weeks, Nuno Mendes’ latest venture, Taberna do Mercado in Old Spitalfields Market, already has London’s critics in raptures, with Time Out’s Guy Dimond lavishing it with five stars.

Inspired by the flavours of his homeland, the casual venue serves Nuno’s take on Portuguese tapas, such as corvina belly with tomato oil; prawn-filled rissoles; tinned prawns with sourdough toast; runner bean fritters and a dessert involving egg custard and red wine. Wines meanwhile shine a light on often-overlooked Portuguese still reds and zippy whites, with a focus on older vintages and wines made from independent producers including 30 by the glass.

The Ivy

With roots snaking back to 1916, when it opened for business as an unlicensed Italian café, celebrity favourite The Ivy reopened its doors in Covent Garden this week after a pricy refurb in time for its centenary next year. Having once played host to Hollywood titans Lawrence Olivier and Marlene Dietrich, the restaurant has retained its signature wood panelling and harlequin stained glass.

Among its new features are the bar, which has been moved from the front to the middle of the room with the addition of fetching pink velvet bar stools, while the old seats have been replaced by crescent moon-shaped racing green banquettes. New works by Damien Hirst hang on the walls and even the menu has been spruced up via dishes like barbequed squid and chorizo, and an on-trend toasted quinoa salad.

Allan Pickett at The Sanderson

Ian Schrager’s original London hotel, The Sanderson, has recruited Allan Pickett, the former head chef at Plateau and Orrery, for a summer residency to keep its offering fresh. Open for three months from June to August, Pickett has created a seasonally focused bespoke menu that blends classic and contemporary British dishes made using summer ingredients, such as seared red mullet with onion farcie in a saffron rouille.

Sprawling from the main restaurant into the garden area outside, a set lunch menu will cost £20 for two courses, while the Market Menu focuses on the produce of the day. Once Pickett has hung up his apron, he’ll open a solo venture, Piquet, in Fitzrovia that shines a light on both England and France.

Naughty Piglets

The brainchild of husband and wife dynamic duo Lyon-born Margaux Aubry of Terroirs and Joe Sharratt, the former head chef of Trinity in Clapham, the 30-seater Naughty Piglets brings a touch of va va voom to Brixton. Dishes of the day are scrawled on a large blackboard in chalk and prepared by Joe in the basement.

Among the food on offer are steamed mussels in bonito butter, duck rillettes, oxtail and parmesan croquettes, Korean pork belly with chili miso, lemon sole, and a black tomato and ricotta salad, with dulce de leche and chocolate mousse for dessert. The majority of the wines on pour are natural, organic and biodynamic, which have managed to win round natural wine skeptic Jay Rayner.

Osteria Francescana pop-up at Sotheby’s

Auction house Sotheby’s is to host a pop-up version of Massimo Bottura’s Osteria Francescana, ranked the second best resultant in the world, at its Bond Street HQ this month. Bottura will man the stoves at the pop-up version of his three Michelin-starred restaurant in Modena, northern Italy, for three nights between 27-29 June where he’ll serve a seven-course tasting menu for £250 per head, with wine pairings costing an additional £95 per head.

Dishes on offer include the Damien Hirst-inspired “Beautiful Psychedelic Spin-painted veal, not flame grilled” – a beef fillet marinated in milk served with tri-colour sauces drizzled like the artist’s spin-paintings. The sixth course, “Oops! I Dropped the Lemon Tart” pays homage to Chinese artist Ai Weiwei’s radical 1995 work Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn. The final course, “Camouflage: Hare in the Woods” is inspired by Pablo Picasso.

Sesame

Perhaps triggered by the runaway success of Jerusalem-inspired sharing plates restaurant The Palomar in Soho, the grand daddy of Levntine cuisine, Yotam Ottolenghi, has opened a casual Middle Eastern joint in Covent Garden alongside his colleague Noam Bar.

Seeking to recreate the sunny, vibrant flavours of their childhoods, among the Moorish (and moreish) dishes on offer are lemon chicken with chopped salad and hummus; spiced lamb kebab with tahini and mint yoghurt; and aubergines, a hard-boiled egg, yoghurt tahini and mango pickle, with rose brownies and sesame brittles to keep things sweet.

Top Dog

Bubbledogs in Fitzrovia first got Londoners howling for hot dogs, which was quickly followed by Dirty Bones in Kensington, that brought a slice of Americana to west London. Aiming to trump them both is Top Dog in Soho, the creation of Matt “Boujis” Hermer and his American wife Marissa.

The shack has a 1950s American biker theme, while the dogs come in pork, veal, beef, chicken or veggie options with a choice of three buns. Among the classics are the Chicago Dog, the Kimchi Dog, the Chili Cheese Steak Dog and a bun rammed with pulled pork and slaw, which can be washed down with organic milkshakes.

José Pizarro

First came José, an adorable, buzzy tapas bar on Bermondsey Street selling the best croquetas in London. Soon after Pizarro followed, a more formal Spanish restaurant yards down the road, specialising in classic Ibérian dishes like cod’s cheek and chorizo. Now, the man behind both has opened the third venue in his trilogy, called… José Pizarro.

Perfectly placed to feed hungry City boys and girls, the restaurant in Liverpool Street is open all day and serves a “full Spanish” breakfast in the morning that includes grilled chorizo or jamón Ibérico with a fried egg and patatas fritas on toast with honey and Mahón cheese. Among the lunch and dinner offerings are Ibérico pork cheeks with olive oil mash; cod with Seville oranges and butterfly grilled mackerel.

The Melt Room

The single dish restaurant trend is showing no sign of slowing – from burger joints and chicken shacks to cereal cafés, Londoners are hungry for simple fixes cooked to perfection. Enter the Melt Room in Soho, which, as the name suggests, flies the flag for grilled cheese sarnies.

Open from 7am, the 12-seater space serves three takes on the toastie: the Classic, rammed with cheddar, one with Swiss cheese, slow cooked lamb shoulder and mustard, and a third with roast beef and red Leicester. All of the sarnies are made with sourdough from a bakery in Wapping, with pickles and goat’s cheese popcorn sold as sides.

Oldroyd

As the doors open to the a new Chelsea site of popular Venetian-inspired small plates restaurant Polpo, found by The Restaurant Man, Russell Norman, his chef director Tom Oldroyd has struck out and opens his first solo venture, Oldroyd, in Islington this month. The 40-seater space, with a café in the basement and a bistro on the ground floor, will serve a small plates menu that changes every day.

Made with locally sourced British ingredients, dishes are inspired by Tom’s travels through Europe and the US and will include English rose veal carpaccio; lamb and almond meatballs; bacon and egg pappardelle; pea and pork jowl croquettes and mustard duck wings.