Six London chefs we think are worth watching in 2010

Catherine Hanly 01 January 2010

The Good Food Guide this week came up with their list of 10 chefs they think will dominate the restaurant scene over the next decade. Four London-based chefs make the grade - Marcus Wareing, Jason Atherton, Angela Hartnett and Shane Osborn. Guide editor Elizabeth Carter said of her chosen few: ‘We were looking at our top 50 list and just wondering who could rise to the top in the next few years.’

Now while no-one’s suggesting that Hartnett, Wareing et al aren’t brilliant chefs, here at Hot Dinners, we thought the Good Food’s list was a little, how shall we put it...safe. After all, when you’ve already got major London restaurants, plus a sprinkling of stars to your name, it could be said you’re already ‘dominating’ the scene.

So, in response, we’ve come up with a list of six chefs we think will be worth watching during the next ten years.

Tom Oldroyd – he took a chance moving from the kitchens of the lauded Bocca Di Lupo, but it paid off when he dazzled critics at Polpo. Oldroyd's boss Russell Norman certainly won’t sit still after Polpo’s success, which in turn could mean big things for Oldroyd.
Nuno Mendes – anyone who attended Nuno Mendes’ Shoreditch supper club, The Loft, will attest to this Portuguese chef’s dazzling way with food. The Loft was Mendes ‘test kitchen’ for the restaurant he’s opening at the Bethnal Green Town Hall in early 2010 where a wider audience will get a chance to see what he can do.
Bruno Loubet – having spent the last seven years sunning himself Sydney-side, Loubet returns to London to take on the Zetter hotel’s restaurant in 2010. He made lot of friends with his old Soho bistros and L’Odeon in the 1990s. Maybe the 2010s will be good for Loubet and Londoners too.
Joseph Trivelli and Stevie Parle (a fellow former River Cafe chef) Now that this duo’s Dock Kitchen has been a resounding success might either Trivelli or Parle be persuaded back to the River Cafe fold to open Ruth Rogers and Rose Gray’s second London restaurant? Either way, Triveli and Parle have proved they have a knack for raising the supperclub game, they have a taste for working for themselves so are worth watching.
Stephen Williams left the Ledbury this year to set up the kitchen at the Harwood Arms and proved, in doing so, that he was more than capable of turning out some of the best dishes a lot of the critics had enjoyed most this year. Certainly a rising gastropub star, it'll be interesting to see what he does next.