Gourmet pop-up restaurant to challenge frozen food perception

N-Ice, the world’s first gourmet restaurant serving a menu created from entirely frozen produce, will run from 8-12 August and has been created to help reinvent the image of frozen food, which has long been perceived to lack the quality and flavour of fresh produce.

Everything served in the restaurant, from herbs and chopped onion to steaks and legs of lamb, will have been frozen before cooking.

Celebrity chefs Simon Rimmer and Atul Kochhar have contributed signature recipes to the project, which will be cooked and served by Westminster Kingsway students. Galton Blackiston, executive chef of the Michelin-starred Morston Hall, has also submitted a recipe for petit pois ice cream.

Kochhar, who holds a Michelin star for his Mayfair restaurant Benares, said: “N-Ice is a bold move - and not before time. There’s been an unfair stigma associated with frozen food for a long time. N-Ice has been purposefully designed to challenge frozen’s image. Its quality has improved dramatically over the years and it is now on a par with - and sometimes better than - chilled equivalents.”

According to a 2005 survey by Horizons, 22 per cent of hospitality purchasers felt frozen food lacked quality compared to fresh, while 14 per cent considered frozen food to have less flavour.