Some of the most talked about food in London is prepared in a back room of a Soho pub using borrowed equipment for patrons who stopped in for a pint. The Sun & 13 Cantons on Berwick Street was home to Asma Khan prior to Darjeeling Express becoming well known, Mandy Yin prior to Sambal Shiok finding its own location, and currently Kaneda Pen, which serves contemporary Cambodian cuisine to anyone who can fit beyond the bar under the moniker Mamapen. Perhaps no other room in British hospitality has generated as much per square foot as this one. It’s a pub, too.
In reality, chef residencies in pub kitchens are not well planned, polished, or clearly restaurant shaped. A blackboard menu, a tiny team, a kitchen that precedes the concept by several decades, and a dining space that doubles as a drinking room with no strong preference about which you are. It wasn’t by coincidence that the format has emerged as one of the key characteristics of how new food enterprises launch in the UK.
The economics are quite straightforward. Pubs already have tables, equipment, licenses, and a steady stream of patrons. Chefs don’t want a full restaurant lease, but they do have an idea and a fan base. These two realities are linked by a residence. The bar receives a food identity it didn’t have to create, and the chef pays rent or a portion of sales. It seems like a straightforward arrangement on paper. In actuality, during the past ten years, it has resulted in some of the most intriguing cooking in Britain.
| Category | Detail |
|---|---|
| Topic | Chef Residencies in UK Pub Kitchens |
| Key venues | The Sun & 13 Cantons (Soho), The Compton Arms (Islington), The Globe Tavern (Borough Market) |
| Notable residency alumni | Darjeeling Express, Sambal Shiok, Sarap, Four Legs, Tendril, Khao Bird, Mondo Sando, Mamapen |
| Market size | UK pub and bar sector forecast at £24.1 billion (2025, Lumina Intelligence) |
| Outlet decline | Approx. 41,691 pub and bar outlets forecast by 2025, down from 45,791 in 2019 |
| Closures | An average of one pub per day closed permanently in England and Wales in 2025 |
| Typical commercial terms | Monthly rent or revenue share of approximately 10–15% of food sales |
| Notable crowdfunding | Four Legs raised £81,245 via Kickstarter; Tendril raised over £150,000; Mondo Sando raised nearly £35,000 |
Perhaps the best example of why this strategy is important is the Compton Arms in Islington. Before Ed McIlroy and Jamie Allan took over The Plimsoll near Finsbury Park and transformed it into one of the most renowned pubs in the nation, Four Legs operated out of that little tavern in north London. They had to create a version of their cheeseburger, which became a cult favorite, in part because every pub had one. The notion was shaped by the pub, not only hosted by it. Tiella and Belly London utilized the Compton kitchen before them, and now Rake is in charge of it with an emphasis on whole beast butchery and sustainable Cornish fish. Not much has changed at the pub. The room becomes increasingly significant as the chefs come and go.
It’s difficult to ignore the extent to which this is being influenced by the current situation of the UK pub industry. In 2025, business rates, energy costs, rising wages, and tighter margins on each pint caused pubs in England and Wales to close at a pace of about one each day. In that sense, a kitchen that is unoccupied Monday through Thursday is a structural weakness rather than a small oversight. A residency enhances drink sales, fills the kitchen, lengthens dwell time, and provides news for the media. Giving the kitchen to an independent operator can seem like a simple answer to a complex issue for landlords who would prefer to focus on the bar and cellar rather than employ cooks, oversee suppliers, and create menus.
Although the computation is different for chefs, the result is the same. Fit out expenses, a lease, business rates, front of house staffing, complete licensing, and investor approval are currently required before a single meal is served to a client in a solo restaurant opening in London. A menu, a modest staff, and a clear contract with the landlord are necessary for a pub residency. Mike Palmer and chef Luke Larsson’s northern Thai BBQ concept, Khao Bird, spent a full year above Before settling on a permanent location in Soho, the Globe Tavern in Borough Market refined its menu and gained popularity. They received something that year that no pitch deck could provide proof that actual clients would make payments, come back, and recommend friends.
The variety of cuisines that are currently being served in pub kitchens demonstrates the breadth of what the concept can accommodate. The beer garden and burger model does not clearly translate to Filipino cuisine, Cambodian spices, Tamil home cooking, Chongqing noodles, or South Indian pub snacks; yet, British diners are more likely to first come across these in pub rooms. A psychological barrier seems to be removed by the informality. The sour pineapple curry and panko pig toast at Mamapen may appeal to a diner who wouldn’t necessarily reserve a special Cambodian restaurant because the setting is already familiar. The pub gives things new emotional legitimacy. That is not a minor issue.
The way residencies operate has completely changed as a result of the media’s focus. Asma Khan subsequently noted that while she worked as a chef at the Sun & 13 Cantons, a review had a big impact. It made her and other cooks realize that a temporary bar kitchen could be taken seriously as a destination rather than a curiosity. Residencies are now considered part of the serious restaurant beat by critics, food newsletters, local guides, and listing websites. Mamapen was reviewed by Time Out. Four Legs at the Compton Arms was reported by The Independent. A chef can create a booking sheet, a mailing list, and a public record without owning a single wall thanks to this press legitimacy.
The extent to which the bar influences the food rather than merely serving it is sometimes overlooked. A chef creating an à la carte menu for a hundred covers must make different decisions than a cook working with a single fryer, a small oven, shared storage, and a customer who might have come in for sport or a quiz. Menus become more constrained. Dishes get more concentrated. The greatest residences frequently create signature dishes like Mamapen’s fried chicken, Khao Bird’s Chiang Mai ribs, and Four Legs burgers not in spite of but because of the limitations. The chef is not asked to open a restaurant by the bar. In a setting where drinking is still the main activity, it asks the cook to be helpful. In contrast to a restaurant, the outcome of that negotiation is frequently more intriguing.
The model’s longevity primarily rests on how honest the terms remain. A residency that places all the risk on the chef while the bar keeps the alcohol revenue is a cheap staffing option rather than a partnership. The finest arrangements provide the chef ample freedom to develop a following that they may take elsewhere if they so want, share data, and explicitly divide responsibilities. The chefs who have moved on to permanent locations did so not because of permanence but rather because the residency provided them with evidence. That distinction is important. Because it doesn’t pretend to be anything else, the pub kitchen serves as a testing ground.
In the UK, there is now something akin to an unofficial infrastructure surrounding this model: marketplace platforms that link independent operators with vacant kitchens, media ecosystems that reward the discovery of a new chef in an unexpected room, and landlords who have established reputations as launch platforms. This could easily be romanticized, and some reportage does just that. The fundamental reasoning is useful. Pubs must serve food that entices patrons. Chefs require inexpensive ways to enter the workforce. The arrangement continues to yield results since neither party currently has a better option.
i) https://www.telegraph.co.uk/luxury/drinking-and-dining/londons-best-guest-chef-residencies/
ii) https://www.thehandbook.com/chef-residencies-london/
iii) https://cluboenologique.com/story/guest-chef-residencies-london/
iv) https://www.squaremeal.co.uk/restaurants/best-for/best-chefs-tables-london_10522