Latest news with #Shoreditch
Sky News
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Sky News
'We charge diners £225 for our tasting menu - here's why it's worth every penny'
Our Money blog team interviews chefs from around the UK, hearing about their cheap food hacks and more. This week, we chat to Isaac McHale, the owner of the two Michelin-starred restaurant Clove Club in London's Shoreditch... My go-to mid-week dinner is... a fried egg on Japanese white rice with furikake, which is the Japanese seasoning mix for sprinkling on a bowl of rice. You can buy this on Amazon or get it from an Asian supermarket for a couple of quid, and buy some Japanese rice while you're at it. I cook the rice and fry an egg gently, then serve the rice with the furikake sprinkled over and a fried egg on top. On the side, I steam some broccoli and stir-fry it with a tiny bit of butter, garlic and a teaspoon of soy sauce. You can always use non-Japanese rice too if you want, and try a few different furikake mixes until you find your favourite. A 50g bag for £4 or £5 will do you eight bowls of rice so it's about 50p a portion - great value for money. My favourite cheap place to eat where I live is... Singburi, the amazing Thai place that raced into the National Top 100 restaurants. I can't remember which critic reviewed it, but all of a sudden it was even more rammed and impossible to get into than before. Industry folk loved it, they'd all go and suggest only ordering from the blackboard. You could get salted fish and rice for £9.50, or poached squid salad for £13. I am sad to say chef Sirichai Kularbwong has closed down his site here, so I'll be travelling to Shoreditch for the new opening instead, which is just round the corner from Bar Valette and The Clove Club. And the one to watch is... Short Road Pizza, which our neighbour Ugo started in lockdown. For now, you can find them at 199 Cambridge Heath Road at the 3 Colts Tavern in Bethnal Green. Amazing pizza, especially with the major pizza hype happening at the moment. Thin base, good crust. I order the Mark Buffalo, with pickled habanero chilli, from the specials' menu. You really don't get much for a wine under a tenner now... but I buy a Chilean pinot noir for £9.75 on GoPuff sometimes and it is great. Rio Rica pinot noir comes in about 15 minutes straight to your door with other groceries. One restaurant in the UK worth blowing out for is... The Ledbury - I am biased after six years working there, but it is the best. The restaurant is 20 years old this year but gets better every time you visit. The impact of the budget means... at Bar Valette, we're taking the very same ingredients you find at The Clove Club (with two Michelin stars) and serving them in a simpler way in a more relaxed setting. We're by no means reducing the quality of what we're working with so that we can provide a cheaper experience. There's a misconception that running restaurants is always very profitable... If more people understood the costs of running a restaurant, and what the impact of new government regulations are having in terms of staff costs and importing produce, they'd be a little more receptive towards our ethos at Bar Valette. I am cooking whole fish, supporting the small boat fishermen who risk their lives every day going out to catch the freshest fish, and I am happy to pay fair prices so they can live a life, and then charge fair prices for them in the restaurant. I also want to make sure my staff are paid well enough and that their salaries reflect the mass inflation we're experiencing everywhere at the moment. The best city in the world to eat in is... Tokyo. You can eat well from high-end restaurants to simple noodles ordered from a vending machine, like at Butagumi (the original old shop location). The last time I was there, it was around £20 for the breaded pork cutlet, rice, soup and salad set meal lunch. And I love great soba restaurants like Ittoan. Sushi counter restaurants often have cheap lunch sets too. Special mention to Mexico City too for delicious tacos and bright sunny happy vibes. Check out El Higualdense for barbacoa goat tacos and pulque, open for breakfast and lunch. I remember vividly watching the 2012 Olympics there at 8am while eating delicious goat tacos and saying no to the fermented pineapple pulque drink. And go to El Turix in upmarket Polanco for Cochinita pibil - a yucatan braised suckling pig, served on panuchos, bean-filled toastadas. Michelin food is not the tastiest food there is... the tastiest food is cooked with care, love and skill, and that could be anywhere, stars or no stars. But a Michelin star is a recognition of a level of skill and quality in the level of cooking. The tastiest things I've eaten in the past 12 months have been from all parts of the world, from tiny neighbourhood places to high-end ones. The pesto pasta at Chez Davia in the French town of Nice was life-changing... and they haven't got a Michelin star or official recognition of any kind. Ganbara in San Sebastian also doesn't boast a Michelin star but is one of the most recognised pintxos bars in the world. At the same time, you can go to The Chairman, Hong Kong, which is near impossible to get a table at, with no Michelin star but it's ranked in The World's 50 Best Restaurants. The whole meal there was amazing. If fine dining is going to have a prosperous future, we need... lower interest rates, wealth inequality, energy prices and the budget deficit and higher GDP and disposable incomes. Easy right? Apart from that, the industry needs to adapt, as it always has, to an ever-changing landscape politically and financially, while keeping its feet on the ground so that it doesn't become so expensive that it is completely out of reach of most people. That doesn't mean being cheap. It's an industry of labour-intensive, high ingredient cost experiences, that bring people loads and loads of joy. But the headwinds facing the industry risk us having to increase prices so much in order to still be viable businesses, and in doing so we price out the vast majority of people who used to be able to come to a fine dining restaurant for a special occasion, and might not be able to in the future. This is caused by... factors way out of our control from tariffs and the reduction in business spending caused by it, from real estate price changes caused by hybrid working and upward only rent reviews, from government policy to Labour trailing doom budgets for six months in the news before they happen. Growth slows as a result of the drip feed of bad news. But people aren't going to stop eating. And people aren't going to stop appreciating delicious food and wines and great service, so there will always be a demand for fine dining and the best places will always remain. We charge £225 for an eight-course tasting menu... that sounds like a lot but it pays for 16 to 18 people working from morning to night, to make fresh bread, fresh butter, chocolates, ice cream and everything else fresh, using the best ingredients we can buy, rare breed meats aged in-house and line-caught fish, to create delicious, amazing food and special memories for our guests every day. It also includes six small bites before the meal, and chocolates and small cakes after. It isn't cheap, but you get a lot of labour and hard work for your money, along with an unforgettable meal. The weirdest request a customer ever made was... a person who wanted Tabasco sauce on each course - we didn't have any in the kitchen but we offered the guest some of our homemade chilli sauce we use for staff meals. She went home and wrote us a one-star review on Google saying the restaurant is awful because we didn't have Tabasco for her to drown her food in. Or the no dairy person asking if she could have the creme brulee after we jumped through hoops to make alterations all through her meal. "Sorry, it has cream in it." "Oh that's ok, I'll have it anyway." Grrrrr.
Daily Mail
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Dame Tracey Emin praises King Charles for his commitment to the arts as they join prominent figures in the industry to celebrate 25 years of the Royal Drawing School
The King was praised for his commitment to drawing by stars of the arts world tonight as they celebrated 25 years of his Royal Drawing School. Dame Tracey Emin said the country was 'lucky to have' a monarch who cared so much, while eclectic cross-dressing potter Grayson Perry described him as 'very special'. The pair both sported what appeared to be the fashionable footwear of the night at St James's Palace - plastic Crocs. While Emin sported dark coloured footwear, Perry naturally sported a brightly-painted pair of iconic clogs to offset his bright orange dress. The palace was packed with renowned artists, creative figures and alumni of the school founded by Charles, 76, as Prince of Wales. To mark the occasion a special anniversary exhibition has been created 'The Power of Drawing: Marking 25 Years of the Royal Drawing School' which includes works by 50 eminent artists and alumni from the school's twenty five year history including Emin and David Hockney. Another star exhibit is one of the King's own drawings, a preliminary sketch of Highgrove from 2000. The free exhibition will go on display at the Royal Drawing School in Shoreditch from July 1- 26. Founded with the help and guidance of artist Catherine Goodman, the Royal Drawing School has made a significant contribution to art education. As an independent, not-for-profit institution, it remains dedicated to high-quality observational drawing tuition. The King, who was accompanied by Queen Camilla, her art dealer daughter Laura Lopes and his artist cousin, Lady Sarah Chatto, spent more than an hour examining the works that will go on display and chatting to guests. A live-drawing session involving some of the school's youngest talents went on throughout the evening, before the guests sat down to listen to a performance by singer songwriter Rufus Wainwright, whose artwork is also being displayed, with a film of work by alumni playing behind him. In an impromptu speech the King offered an unusually emotional tribute to Goodman for her work with the school over the years. He said: 'I can't resist saying a few very small words because above all I wanted to pay a very special tribute to darling Catherine who, can you believe it, it all goes back really to when my very special cousin, Sarah [Chatto], and Catherine were young 18-year-old students at Camberwell School of Art and used to come bouncing in to my room. I remember that was where it all started. 'So when I needed somebody to start the life drawing classes at my original old Institute of Architecture in Regent's Park, I thought Catherine is the ideal person. Otherwise these young trainee architects won't understand the importance of life drawing in terms of proportion, scale and everything else. 'Her dedication and her love for the students created this remarkable, I hope, legacy which will continue. So we do all owe her a huge debt of gratitude. The King, who was accompanied by Queen Camilla, her art dealer daughter Laura Lopes and his artist cousin, Lady Sarah Chatto, spent more than an hour examining the works that will go on display and chatting to guests In an impromptu speech the King offered an unusually emotional tribute to Goodman for her work with the school over the years 'Imagine, just perhaps, how proud I am am of all these students over all these years. I have always believed in investing in talent for the future in many different spheres, particularly in the cultural world but also in all sorts of others. 'So see these young people develop into middle aged people still painting is remarkable and achieving so much and I hope enabling them to discover and develop and demonstrate their remarkable talents. It's an investment that has been rewarded a thousand fold. ' Dame Tracey Emin spoke warmly about the King, whom she has known for several years. 'It's thrilling, so nice. His speech was from the heart. He knows what he is talking about,' he said. 'Imagine how lucky we are to have a king who loves art and knows what he is talking about. His is a very nice drawing, it's a sketch, very loose, very nice.' Gesturing to the display, she added: 'I am hanging next door but one to the king. It's not often that you can say that. 'His time and energy is phenomenal. Drawing is more important than it ever was. We are going through such terrible times at the moment and we are so lucky to have a King who has such a great understanding of many different things, and to be here tonight talking about drawing and art gives you faith in humanity. We people are drawing or painting or making art, they are not going to war. ' Her words were echoed by Wainright, who also attended art college, and told the audience between songs: 'All I wanted to say is that drawing for me now has become a necessary tool to really save my mind from all the distractions that we are faced with in the world. It's more important than ever for people to draw and focus on what isn't there.' Goodman paid tribute to the King as a man who 'never minded swimming against the tide' when he started the drawing school, which does not receive any official funding but relied on donations. She added: 'He decided to give drawing a home and a place for students to come and learn. To make sure this important living tradition was celebrated and protected. ' With over 350 different courses for adults and children of all abilities, including a renowned full-year postgraduate-level programme and a wide range of scholarships, the Royal Drawing School is accessible to all regardless of background or circumstance.
Globe and Mail
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Globe and Mail
Lee Chambers speaks at the inaugural SXSW London event
He took to the stage to speak about the future of masculinity at Truman Brewery in Shoreditch Lee Chambers, the founder and CEO of Male Allies UK, took to the stage at SXSW London this week. On the opening day of the first ever SXSW London, which was hosted in Shoreditch, he took to the stage at the Truman Brewery talking about manhood and masculinity. Chambers was joined by Dawn Paine of Aurora and Nishma Patel Robb of the Glittersphere, bring a range of perspectives to the discussion on the future of men and boys. They explored the work Male Allies UK do, men's inclusion in the workplace, and the challenges of young boys in the UK today. There was also discussion of what brands need to be doing to make a positive impact. Male Allies UK is a consultancy that specialises in men's inclusion, male allyship skills and closing gender gaps. Launched in 2024 by business psychologist Lee Chambers, they work with men across 12 industries and carry out research on the benefits to men of building inclusion skills, and with boys to understand their lives, challenges and thoughts for their future. SXSW London a new, first of it's kind event in Europe, bringing the SXSW experience to London. It's where creative and tech industires converge, featuring music, film, business and innovation across 14 venues for six days. The venues, spread across Shoreditch and Hoxton, will feature keynotes, music showcases, art exhbitions, film premieres and tech demonstrations. On taking the stage on the first day of SXSW London, Lee Chambers said, "It's been amazing to see SXSW come to the UK and bring so much colour and excitement to the city. To be able to take to the stage, alongside well known changemakers and luminaries, was a real honour and a chance to reflect on how far we have come. They've set the bar now, and will have to go even bigger for 2026!" Other speakers at this year's SXSW London included actor Idris Elba, Deepmind CEO Demis Hassabis and former British Prime Minister David Cameron.
The Independent
4 days ago
- Business
- The Independent
New Amazon fulfilment centres planned in £40 billion investment
Amazon announced a substantial £40 billion investment in the UK over the next three years, aiming to create thousands of new jobs. The investment includes new fulfilment centres in Hull (opening this year with 2,000 jobs) and Northampton (opening 2026 with 2,000 jobs), with two more planned for the East Midlands by 2027. Amazon will also expand its London headquarters in Shoreditch and invest in data centres, drone technology, its Prime streaming service, and staff benefits. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer praised the investment as a "major win" for the UK economy, emphasising its potential to create job opportunities nationwide. Amazon's leadership stated the investment is specifically targeted at boosting regions outside London and the South East, aligning with efforts to level up economic opportunities.
The Sun
18-06-2025
- The Sun
One of Britain's tallest men puts height to the test by spending night in UK's smallest hotel room
One of the tallest people in the country spent the night in one of the UK's smallest hotel rooms - and it went exactly as you'd expect. From knees dangling off the bed to the occasional headbutt, the stay put the everyday quirks of being tall to the ultimate test. 3 3 Theo Turner, who stands at a towering 7ft, spent a night at the easyHotel in Shoreditch, London, where the bed is 6ft 2 inches long and the compact room measures ten square metres – it was understandably, a tight fit. It comes after research commissioned by the hotel brand revealed the top 20 hotel pet peeves, with uncleanliness, uncomfortable beds, and noisy rooms at the top of the list. With other common complaints including slow or unreliable Wi-Fi, hidden or unexpected fees and unhelpful staff. Theo, 30, from Middlesborough, who is just eight inches off being the UK's tallest man, said: 'Being seven foot tall has its pros and cons. "But it's something that I've come to live with, and personally I love it – I wouldn't change it for the world. 'When I'm travelling, I always have to pay for extra leg room on flights and trains and I duck everywhere I go. " Finding a bed that fits my large stature can be difficult – so my go to is to starfish across the bed, otherwise my legs are hanging off the end. "Hotel stays are always an adventure, but as long as I have a comfortable bed and can rest easy, I'm happy.' A spokesperson for easyHotel, which commissioned the research, said: 'We like to call our rooms 'cosy', but even we'll admit this was a bit of a squeeze. 'But when you're on an exciting city break, we know our guests value experience over expanse. 'You don't want to spend your money on a huge room you're not going to be in for most of the time. "Instead, you want a hotel that provides a great night's rest, and our quality four-star style mattresses deliver just that. 'And for our taller guests, we tested things out ourselves – and if someone who is 7ft tall can squeeze in and sleep well, there's hope for the rest of you too.' The study also revealed 14 per cent of travellers get wound up frustrated by hotels inconveniently located to their main destination. But 63 per cent believe a hotel is just somewhere to lay your head, and as long as it delivers core comforts it doesn't need to be fancy. While 96 per cent didn't consider room size to be the most important feature when booking. For 37 per cent, the single most important attribute is price per night, while 32 per cent want to be close to transport, and 25 per cent consider the comfort of the bed. Price is also what will get most people to re-book a hotel (67 per cent), and 26 per cent are swayed by friendly staff. Travellers are also far more likely to trust online reviews like TripAdvisor and Google (30 per cent) than recommendations from friends or family (nine per cent). And 58 per cent are likely to stay at a hotel chain they've never used before, according to the figures. A spokesperson for easyHotel added: 'When it comes to booking a hotel, people's priorities are shifting. 'It's less about how many square metres the room offers and more about convenience, comfort, and location. 'That's why we focus on what matters most: great sleep in smartly designed compact rooms that enable us to offer great value prices and central locations. 'Whether it's a boutique stay or a compact city-centre pad, travellers increasingly see hotels as a springboard to the real adventure – the city itself.'
