Chotto Matte Marylebone - Marylebone, London

Since opening its doors in Soho, Kurt Zdesar's Nikkei restaurant Chotto Matte has gone from strength to strength, opening a string of restaurants in locations running the gamut from Miami and Toronto to San Francisco, Nashville and Los Angeles. We were very excited when we heard the news that Chotto Matte was returning to London with another site, this time in the leafy, distinguished Paddington Street in Marylebone. We popped in to investigate, and found that Chotto Matte had a few new tricks up its sleeve, which it must have learned along the way. 

The new site was designed by the award-winning Andy Martin architecture and sits easy in among the high-end boutiques and art galleries of Marylebone. It feels rather chic and grown up, with all key features inspired by Tokyo's contemporary urban culture. This comes to fruition in beautiful features such as a natural lava stone hemming in the restaurant and striking ceiling sculptures that rivet the attention almost as much as the food. After settling in with an excellent pisco sour, we took a gander at the menu designed by exec chef Jordan Sclare. It wasn't long before a litany of flavourful bites followed. 

A smattering of padrón peppers in den miso set the scene, beautifully blistered. We were smitten by small plates such as Kingfish "Nikkei Sashimi" with cherry tomatoes, jalapeño, coriander, yuzu truffle soy, as well as O-Toro Yaki Niku premium tuna belly with chilli, spring onion and coriander cress. King crab butter leaf tacos were given an exotic inflection with sharon fruit, avocado tempura, chilli and tobiko caviar, whilst Argentinian red prawn truffles were strikingly black and spherical, served with truffled shiitake mushroom and spring onion. Of everything sampled, our two fave dishes were the Pato Crujiente Con Salsa Peruana - a crispy duck served with honey orange ponzu and piquant jalapeño - as well as a Dragon Roll of prawn tempura, salmon, avocado and unagi sauce. 

We were massively won over by Chotto Matte's newest effort. It really feels that the brand is enterprising and innovating rather than sitting on their laurels.