Alfresco

• Buckingham Palace is opening its gardens for picnics - for real, this time

  

  We always like to think of ourselves here at Hot Dinners as influential, but we never expected to have the ear of the royal family. Although how else do you explain the fact that eight days after we ran with this April Fool storyabout Buckingham Palace opening its garden to the public for alfresco dining, the story appears

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• 14 Hills in the City are unveiling a rooftop restaurant on the 15th floor

  

  Before lockdown D&D's City restaurant 14 Hills was doing a storming business. Now, with the announcement of a new rooftop terrace, they're hoping to reopen with a similarly strong following.

  The 14th-floor restaurant has moved up a level, taking over space in the building's 15th-floor rooftop garden. It'll have quite the view over London and room for around 50 diners.

  The terrace's opening menu will feature

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• Picnic in the Queen's back garden with Alfresco At The Palace

  

  Update: 12pm. Well done to those of you who spotted it - this was our April Fool's Day story - joining a long line of times we've tried with varying degrees of success to pull the wool over your eyes. Mind you, it actually is a good idea....

   

  It's been a very tough 12 months for the hospitality business. And for

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• Gordon Ramsay's Street Pizza gets ready to open at Battersea Power Station

  

  Updated 31/3/21 with opening date

  Back before Christmas, we talked about Gordon Ramsay's plans to roll out several of his more casual restaurants across London. However, with the arrival of a new lockdown, some of those plans were obviously pushed back.

  But now it seems

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• St. Felix Place in Borough is London's newest outdoor eating and drinking space

  

  From the team behind Flat Iron Square and Goods Way comes their latest alfresco project - featuring beer, BBQ, pizza and music

• The Berkeley adds multicoloured beach huts for alfresco dining

  

  30/03/21 - Updated with new pics

  When the first lockdown ended, The Berkeley was one of the first to completely reinvent its outside space, turning the back of the hotel into The Garden - a rather beautiful alfresco restaurant. Now, as we emerge from the latest lockdown,

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• The Dorchester unveils plans for a new roof terrace restaurant

  

  The Dorchester has unveiled its alfresco plans for London's grand reopening next month and they include the arrival of a brand new roof garden. It's the first time the hotel has expanded its outdoor plans to its roof and the space will play host to a variety of pop-ups hosted by the hotel's various chefs, from executive chef Mario Perera to The Grill at The Dorchester's Tom Booton and Jean-Philippe Blondet

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• The Wigmore launches a huge summer terrace and garden with food by Michel Roux Jr

  

  Finding unused alfresco space in the centre of London isn't an easy ask - but the folk at The Wigmore on Regent Street have managed just that. The gastropub, which is part of the five start The Langham London hotel, has not only found some alfresco space, they've found ALL the alfresco space.

  Cunningly, they've connected the pubs terrace with the hotel’s courtyard garden area to form one large dining area, all covered

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• Kerridge's Garden Grill pops up at the Corinthia London

  

  A Hot Dinners exclusive

  It's fair to say chefs and restaurateurs are being pretty cunning when it comes to finding ways to ensure they can reopen on 12 April. Take Tom Kerridge for example. His restaurant, Kerridge's Bar and Grill, at the Corinthia London, doesn't have any outside space. But, as if by magic, the hotel's managed to conjure some out of thin air.

  To that end, Kerridge's

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• The Terrace by Megan's is their new alfresco restaurant on Clapham Common

  

  Megan's already have a successful restaurant in Clapham - but they're about to open a second. This has one key difference, it's going to be in the middle of Clapham Common and it's going to be an alfresco restaurant. 

  Called The Terrace by Megan's, it's taking over what used to be Recovery Kitchen, for a fully covered terrace restaurant. They'll have a slightly

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• Patty&Bun spin-off Sidechick is becoming a real restaurant

  

  One of the developments we're seeing as we emerge into a post-lockdown world is that some formerly delivery-only businesses are getting ready to launch real life restaurants. The latest of these is Patty&Bun spin-off Sidechick, which is actually opening on James Street, just a few doors down from the original Patty&Bun.

  If you're unfamiliar with Sidechick, they

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• Allegra is launching a Happy Burger pop-up on its terrace (and special residencies too)

  

  With the April date of alfresco opening getting ever closer, one restaurant is trying something new when they return. Patrick Powell and the Allegra team will be opening their (fantastic looking) rooftop terrace with a new pop-up called Happy Burger

  On the new menu will be: 

  • ‘The Happy Burger’, an Oklahoma-style onion burger with American cheese (and a Beyond Meat alternative too). If you don't know what an
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• Leyton's Filly Brook pub crowdfunds its way to a new alfresco space

  

  Having an outside space matters more than ever for hospitality businesses. Anywhere in London that can do alfresco will have a clear month's extra trading before inside dining resumes in May.

  One East London pub's solution to the problem has been to seek help from its customers -

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• Central London's streets are reopening for alfresco dining in April

  

  This is very welcome news. Westminster Council have just confirmed that Londoners can expect a return to dining in the streets of Soho, Marylebone and St James this summer.

  The council said that as soon as venues were allowed to open (all being well this will be on 12 April) they'll support the hospitality industry with "the return of temporary measures to enable al fresco hospitality across Westminster". They've

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• Brat at Climpson's Arch is going to be a permanent fixture

  

  When London emerged from its first lockdown all those months ago, one of the first restaurants to completely reinvent itself was Tomos Parry's Brat. While the original restaurant stayed where it was (with a bit of table rejigging) they complimented it with a sister restaurant at Climpson's Arch, correctly assuming that alfresco dining would be very much a big thing in 2020.  

  Brat at Climpsons

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