Friday Five: the week's top news
- Tom Simmons' eponymous Tower Bridge restaurant is continuing to trade after being bought out of administration. The chef says he has maintained he same staff and suppliers following a change in ownership.
- Members of the industry, including Wahaca co-founder Thomasina Miers and chef Mark Lloyd, have backed a petition calling on the government to scrap a planned policy which could ban knife suppliers from shipping their wares to customers' homes. The petition has reached over 20,000 signatures, and will be debated in parliament if it hits 100,000.
- Aktar Islam, the former chef director of Birmingham's Lasan Group, is gearing up for the expansion of his own company, AI Restaurants. He spoke to BigHospitality about his plans for the future and fighting to keep space for independent restaurants.
- Chef Kieren Steinborn-Busse and his wife Natasha are to open a restaurant in Buntingford, Hertfordshire, later this year. The Falcon will be the first solo project from the chef, who previously oversaw the food at Vinoteca and was head chef at Thackeray's in Tunbridge Wells when it was awarded a Michelin star in 2002.
- Tom Kitchin will add a fourth restaurant to The Kitchin Group portfolio when he launches Southside Scran in Edinburgh in November. The menu will feature rotisserie-focused dishes alongside a daily seafood selection.
For more of this week's news, click here.
