James Martin to launch first London restaurant
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TV chef James Martin is planning to open his first London restaurant.
The host of BBC1’s Saturday Kitchen told the Standard it would be a “casual, accessible” venture in central London.
Martin, right, who has a restaurant in Manchester and has run other venues in his home county of Yorkshire, said: “We’re about four weeks away from exchanging on the London site.
“It won’t be fine dining, it will be casual. It will be different but I want it to be accessible to everybody.”
Martin, 43, said the restaurant — a permanent venture which he hopes to launch in “six to eight months” — will use British produce.
“Yeah, it’s got to be, as a pig farmer’s son,” he said. “What sort of food? Let’s get the site then figure out the food. I’ve an idea and we’ve got a few plans.”
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Martin, who found fame on Ready Steady Cook, insisted he is not a celebrity chef as he still works in his restaurant and said he would have a hands-on role in London. “I’m a chef by trade, I don’t look at this celebrity stuff.
“I like going to my restaurant and cooking. I don’t know if that’s good or bad nowadays in the celebrity chefdom world but I enjoy it.”
The cook, who headlines the Ascot Festival of Food and Wine Race Weekend today and tomorrow, said his hands-on approach kept him on top of trends more than chefs who work solely on television.
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