Latest opening: Elis
What: A buzzy restaurant in Bethnal Green’s trendy Town Hall Hotel serving Brazilian-Italian cuisine. Elis is little sister to the east London hotel’s two Michelin-starred Da Terra, which also explores Brazilian and Italian food but via a lengthy £215 tasting menu. Located on the first floor in the bijou space that was home to Corner Room, Elis is a far more relaxed affair, offering a tightly-written menu that’s designed for sharing.
Who: Da Terra chef Rafael Cagali. Born and raised in São Paulo, Cagali is Italian on his father’s side and a mix on his mother’s side, including some Portuguese, some Spanish and some Italian. He started cooking relatively late on in life, but nonetheless possesses a top flight cooking CV that includes multi Michelin-starred restaurants in Spain and Italy as well as the UK’s own The Fat Duck and Simon Rogan’s Fera and Aulis. Launched in 2019, Da Terra has quickly established itself as one of London’s most creative and distinctive restaurants. The kitchen at Elis is headed by Joe Holness, who has worked with Cagali at Da Terra from day one (he was also with him at Fera). Like Da Terra, Elis will be a partnership with the Loh Lik Peng-owned hotel but Cagali has full creative control of the menu.
The vibe: The 30-cover space doesn’t look dramatically different to Corner Room - the installation of pendant lighting remains - but has been freshened up and now features a colourful banquette running along the back wall. Overall, the Studio Nathan Miller-designed space strikes a good balance between fitting in with the hotel and having its own identity.
The food: The menu kicks off with small plates including bolinhos de bacahau (salt cod fritters); crudo of Arctic Char with tucupi dressing; panzanella; and veal tartare with bone marrow, deep-fried strands of potato and tiny pickled chillies before moving onto pasta dishes and mains including crab linguini; monkfish tail, black tucupi glaze and haricot beans; and Iberico pork with black beans and chimichurri. Prices are fairly approachable given Cagali’s pedigree with small plates averaging out at £10, pasta averaging out at £17 and larger plates priced between £20 and £38. Portion sizes for the latter category are unusually generous and - to Cagali’s credit - nearly all the dishes on the menu can be shared easily.
To drink: Elis has handed over control of its wine list to Keeling Andrew & Co., the wine company that’s run by Noble Rot founders Dan Keeling and Mark Andrew. The offering is concise but regularly-changing, with around 12 bottles available at any one time and around 50% of the selection available by the glass. Prices range from £30 to around £100 a bottle.
And another thing: A lot of top chefs struggle to rework their cuisine to suit a more casual setting, but it seems to have come naturally to Cagali. The chef has managed to reference some of the flavours and ingredients that Da Terra is known for in a way that feels fresh. It feels personal too, with the restaurant a tribute to his mother, who at one point ran a São Paulo restaurant named after famed Brazilian musician Elis Regina. “I have wanted to explore some of the more relaxed elements of Brazilian and Italian food culture for some time; drawing on everything from my favourite street food to family meal celebration dishes that my grandma used to make,” the chef says.
