Kitchen W8, Kensington
Name: Kitchen W8 Address: 11-13 Abingdon Rd, Kensington, London W8 6AH Website: None Location: Kensington Budget: $$$ Price: £65pp Tasting Menu, £105 with wine pairings. What I recommend: 6 course tasting menu, Pain Perdu from the dessert menu.
Nested in a small side-street off of High Street Kensington, with a modest front, is Kitchen W8. Upon our first visit we found a restaurant which manages to balance simple clean design and eye-catching modern art dotted around the plan, with a sense of comfort. Owners Philip Howard & Rebecca Mascarenhas aptly call it “a home away from home”.
An affordable Michelin star tasting menu (£65pp) included some of the most interesting pairings I’ve seen all year, with great use of lesser known root vegetables and seasonal mushrooms. The 6 course tasting menu features Cod with Salsify and truffle emulsion, as well as Game Raviolo with Roscoff Onion, Pickled apple and Trompette Mushrooms. My favourite however was the piece which kicked off our evening. A Beautifully smoked, thinly sliced eel with grilled mackerel and golden beetroots.
Kitchen W8 is a place I’ll return to time and again to experience Mark Kempson’s creativity, in what sometimes seems like a very repetitive fine dinning scene among Michelin starred venues in London.
