Game on: the best grouse and game restaurants in London

No other seasonal ingredient arrives with quite the bang that grouse does, with the first shots fired on 12 August marking the beginning of the British game season. Whether your taste is traditional or modern, here are the best London restaurants for grouse and game this year.  

45 Jermyn St 

You’d expect a restaurant neighbouring the Queen’s grocer, Fortnum & Mason, to do a classy line in grouse. The kitchen team will be shooting their grouse in the Lammermuir Hills in the Scottish Borders before shooting back to London to serve a 12th August supper of roast grouse accompanied by liver parfait on toast, red cabbage and ceps. Every bit of the bird is being put to good use ("beak to feet", if you will), so from the week of 14 August there’ll be a grouse and foie gras pie with a malt gravy made from the carcass, and roast grouse with bread sauce and a hotpot made from the braised legs. 45 Jermyn Street, London, SW1Y 6DN; 45jermynst.com

Claude Bosi at Bibendum 

“We don’t have much grouse in France so it’s a pleasure for me to cook with,” says Bibendum’s recently installed top toque Claude Bosi, who has been in charge of the kitchens of the Chelsea landmark since April and will be serving grouse from 14th August. Upstairs in the more formal dining room, Bosi will be injecting the bird with some fine dining modernity in the shape of Scottish grouse with girolles, sourdough bread sauce and sweetcorn and curry purée; if you’d prefer something more traditional, roast grouse with game chips and bread sauce will be served in the downstairs Oyster Bar.  Michelin House, 51 Fulham Road, London, SW3 6RD; bibendum.co.uk

D&D London

D&D’s City restaurants are going great guns for grouse this autumn. At Coq d’Argent, it’s classic roast grouse with liver croutons, game chips and bread sauce, while elsewhere on the menu there’s venison, partridge, pigeon and wild boar. There’s also roast grouse with paté and bread sauce at New Street Grill, and grouse with bread sauce and game chips at the Butler’s Wharf, Paternoster and South Place Chop Houses – although for the ultimate in gamey luxury, head to Launceston Place in Kensington for its signature dish of pigeon foie gras puff pastry. Various locations; danddlondon.com

The Jugged Hare

City gastropub The Jugged Hare will be one of the first London restaurants to serve grouse on the Glorious Twelfth itself: its chefs will race down from Yorkshire to cook a five-course grouse and game dinner (￡95) matched to specially chosen wines. Highlights of the menu include roast breast and confit leg of grouse with spiced cabbage, grouse liver paté, game chips, malted bread sauce and hunter’s sauce paired with a 2015 Mahi pinot noir from New Zealand. Later this game season there is a Suffolk venison and Languedoc wine dinner on 13 September, a game and Bordeaux dinner on 8 November – plus roast woodcock, snipe baked in potato, grouse tacos, squirrel croquettes and game tasting boards.  49 Chiswell Street, London, EC1Y 4SA; thejuggedhare.com

Lyle’s

James Lowe, chef-owner of this minimalist Shoreditch temple to modern cooking, will take delivery of 30 birds from Northumberland every day during grouse season. Roast grouse for two to share will first appear on Lyle’s dinner menu on 14 August, perhaps as wood-roast grouse with fermented mulberries and grouse liver toast, before the bird makes its way onto the lunch menu as grilled grouse with grilled corn, or with bread sauce and pickled elderberries. The restaurant’s fourth annual Game event on 15 and 16 September, meanwhile, will see some of the world’s best chefs cook a game-focused tasting menu alongside Lowe. The Tea Building, 56 Shoreditch High Street, London, E1 6JJ; lyleslondon.com

Plateau

D&D London’s Canary Wharf restaurant is going one better than its stablemates with a series of week-long supper clubs devoted to a different game bird from August to October. Things kick off on 14 August with grouse, roasted and served with wild mushrooms, celeriac bread sauce and game chips, with venison carpaccio with smoked yoghurt and pickled mushrooms to start, Eton mess for pud, as well as canapés and a bottle of pale ale. Partridge will take the spotlight in September and pheasant in October. The dinners cost from ￡45 per person. 4th Floor, Canada Place, London, E14 5ER; plateau-restaurant.co.uk

Rabbit

Rus in urbe is the theme of the Gladwin brothers’ hotspot for the King’s Road’s jeunesse dorée, where antlers hang on the wall and many of the ingredients come from the family’s Sussex farm (including wine from their own Nutbourne Vineyards). The multi-tasking siblings haven’t managed to start a grouse moor on the South Downs yet but they have teamed up with the London Shooting Club to serve grouse fresh from the Yorkshire Moors on the Glorious Twelfth itself. Expect roast grouse with candied beetroot, smoked onion petals, blackcurrants and Armagnac game sauce. 172 King’s Road, London, SW3 4UP; rabbit-restaurant.com

Rules 

If you want a wild equivalent of farm to table, look no further than London’s oldest restaurant (est 1798), which owns its own Teesdale estate surrounded by some of England’s best grouse moors in the wilds of County Durham. Grouse fresh from the High Pennines served with all the trimmings will be on the menu from 14 August; later in the season, look out for anything from partridge, wild duck and pheasant from the restaurant’s Lartington Estate – “and as always we will feature other game birds such as teal and woodcock whenever we can lay our hands on them,” says Rules’s managing director Ricky McMenemy.  35 Maiden Lane, London, WC2E 7LB; rules.co.uk

Best of the Rest

1 Lombard Street
Roast grouse with game chips and bread sauce; from late August 1 Lombard Street, London, EC3V 9AA; 1lombardstreet.com

The Cinnamon Club 
Tandoor-smoked breast of grouse with bitter fenugreek, corn stir-fry and tamarind-cumin jus; from 12 August 30 Great Smith Street, London, SW1P 3BU; cinnamonclub.com

Elystan Street 
Grouse breast with a croustillant of the leg, crushed celeriac and elderberries; from 16 August
43 Elystan Street SW3 3NT; elystanstreet.com

The Game Bird 
Roast grouse with game chips, bread sauce, braised legs and liver paté en croute; from 14 August
The Stafford London, 16-18 St James’s Place, London, SW1A 1NJ; thestaffordlondon.com

Hélène Darroze at The Connaught 
Roast grouse with ras el hanout spices, chickpea purée, confit onions and fresh grapes; from mid-August
Carlos Place, London, W1K 2AL; theconnaught.co.uk

Kitchen W8
Roast Yorkshire grouse with smoked celeriac, pickled plums and bacon; from 18 August
11-13 Abingdon Road, London, W8 6AH; kitchenw8.com

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