Adam Handling to open zero-waste restaurant serving chicken feet and Champagne

Scottish chef Adam Handling is to add another site to his London restaurant empire, unveiling plans for a restaurant and Champagne bar on the King’s Road that aims to make zero-waste “luxurious”.

Deboned chicken feet with caviar

The new restaurant, called Ugly Butterfly, is set to open on 13 November. It is collaborative project between Handling, Cadogan, the Quintessentially Foundation and The Felix Project.

Open from Wednesday to Sunday from lunchtime until late evening, the new site intends to be both a restaurant and a hub for local businesses and sustainability initiatives.

The menu, featuring snacks and small plates, includes the likes of deboned crispy fried chicken feet with caviar; cheese doughnuts made with leftovers from the cheeseboard; banana bread and chicken butter; lobster shell soup; broccoli stalk Caesar salad; retired dairy cow tartare, crispy potato peelings; and reformed doughnuts (made with leftover bread) and overripe fruit jam.

Dishes are all produced using ingredients that are usually discarded, most of which will come from nearby Adam Handling Chelsea and focusing on the four most-wasted items: bread, milk, eggs and bananas.

The site’s design will reflect the restaurant’s zero-waste ethos, with the interiors constructed out of up-cycled and recycled materials.

The wine list will have a strong focus on Champagne, with a large array available by the glass.

Ugly Butterfly will also serve as a venue for talks, with chef Mike Robinson, founder of The Woodsman and co-owner of the Harwood Arms and Steve Bannatyne of The Wood Store, which made the furniture for the restaurant out of recycled and reclaimed wood, already scheduled to appear.

Banana bread and chicken skin butter

Commenting on the new venture, Handling said: “This is such an exciting collaboration. Across my restaurants and bars we have a strong commitment to achieving zero waste and in setting up Ugly Butterfly, we can help to move the sustainability agenda forward even further by bringing together the pioneers in sustainable food and drink, fashion, business, furnishings, technology, arts and crafts and giving them a home for some really interesting discussions.

“We want everyone to be able to drop in for some really tasty food, and delicious Champagne, and to contribute to building awareness of how we can live our lives, every day, on a more sustainable basis.”

2.5% of the restaurant’s takings will be donated to The Felix Project, a London-based charity which collects surplus food and delivers it to those in need.

The menu also includes two dishes which use pullet eggs – eggs laid by pullets (hens less than a year old) which are usually discarded due to their small size. Money from Feast Fairly pullet egg sales will also be donated to The Felix Project.

Handling opened his first restaurant – The Frog – in Ely’s Yard in Spitalfields in 2016. A second Frog opened in Covent Garden in 2017, becoming Handling’s flagship site with a cocktail bar called Eve.

Last summer, Handling relocated his original Frog to a larger space in Hoxton Square and in February this year, he opened Adam Handling Chelsea, located in the Belmond Cadogan Hotel.

Ugly Butterfly shares the philosophy of Handling’s café and beer shop Bean & Wheat, which is adjoined to The Frog Hoxton. Like the Ugly Butterfly will do for Adam Handling Chelsea, Bean & Wheat focuses on reducing waste and using by-products and off-cuts from The Frog Hoxton.