This Thursday, Gina turns one.

A whole year! It feels completely surreal to write that. This time last year we were taking the plunge- all guns blazing- opening a neighbourhood restaurant in Chingford and hoping, more than anything, that people would get what we were trying to do.

And you did.

You came in for lunch, for dinner, for birthdays, for quick bowls of pasta, for long tables, for glasses of wine, for peach cobbler, for midweek meals, for celebrations after wedding registry’s and full, noisy weekends. You told your friends, you brought your families. You cheered us on. You sent kind messages. You booked again. You helped make this little restaurant feel alive.

Over the past year we’ve been through a whole turn of the seasons, changed menus, found our rhythm, made mistakes, learned a lot, and somehow, wonderfully, found ourselves awarded a Bib Gourmand. We’ve had some incredible national reviews, and a few very special visitors make the journey to Chingford too - which still makes us smile.

But more than any of that, the thing we feel most proud of is that Gina has become a place people want to come back to.

So, from all of us: thank you. To everyone who has supported us, wished us well, told someone about us, booked a table, posted a photo, popped in for a drink, or simply said “keep going” you really have helped get us here.

To celebrate our first birthday this Thursday, we’d love to raise a glass with you.

At lunch, we’ll be offering 25% off food and drinks for all bookings.

At dinner, welcome drinks are on us.

Come and celebrate with us if you can. We’d absolutely love to see you.

With huge love and thanks,

Rav, Mattie, Tom and the Gina team x

Find a table here

A quick one from me.

We’re holding our next paid subscribers’ evening on Monday 8th June from 5–7pm at Gina. We’ll be hosting you with a selection of cakes, bakes and tea for a little chinwag about how it’s all been going.

I want to chat about our first year, share some insights into the business and, of course, have that discussi…

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So this week’s free recipe is a pavlova piled high with mango, passionfruit and cream - the sort of pudding that looks impressive despite being mostly just whisking, waiting and cooling. Crisp on the outside, marshmallowy in the middle, and a very good thing to put in the centre of the table after a barbecue or long lazy lunch in the garden. The honey and salt in the cream give the thing balance and the sharp passionfruit keeps it bright and cooling.

I’ll also be making a gooseberry pavlova on Saturday Kitchen this weekend, so if you fancy another pavlova variation or just want to watch me demo it for visual cues, tune in.

Right. Put some music on, open the windows, and make this before the weather turns.

Mango & Passionfruit Pavlova Recipe

Serves 6-8 people

Makes: 1 x 10 inch pavlova

Time: 1.5-3 hours + cooling time

Pavlova ingredients:

4 egg whites (at 30g each)

200g caster sugar

1tbsp white wine vinegar

2 tbsp cornflour

1 tbsp vanilla bean paste/extract (optional)

Whipped cream ingredients & toppings

400ml double cream

2 tbsp runny honey

Pinch of maldon sea salt

2 large mangoes, sliced

150ml mango puree, fresh or tinned

4-5 passion fruits for the seeds

Crushed pistachios Or pomegranate seeds (I used the latter here because I was making this for someone with a nut allergy)

Method:

• Preheat the oven to 100C fan/ 120C oven.

• Prepare a baking sheet, lined with baking paper.

• Place the egg whites, white wine vinegar and vanilla (if using) in the clean bowl of a stand mixer with a whisk attachment. Whisk at a medium speed for 7-10 minutes, past the frothy stage, until you see soft peaks form. (You can also make this in a mixing bowl with a hand-held electric whisk).

• Start adding the sugar to the whipping egg whites, a tablespoon at a time. Gradually increase the speed of the mixer as you do so.

• By the time you add the last of the sugar you should be whisking at a medium/high speed

• Continue whisking for 2-3 minutes until stiff peaks form and the meringue is thick and glossy.

• At this point, add in the cornflour, mixing slowly at first and gradually increasing the speed until it is all mixed in. Stop here – you don’t want the meringue to deflate.

• Shape the meringue into one large mound on your pre-prepared baking sheet.

• Bake the pavlova for 2-3 hours, you will know it’s done when you can lift it up clean from the paper.

• Remove the meringue from the oven and leave it to cool completely before serving.

• To serve: Lightly whip the cream with the honey and pinch of salt until it’s lightly whipped and can hold its shape

• Top the pavlova with the cream and the sliced mango, drizzle over the mango puree with passionfruit seeds and finally sprinkle over the roasted pistachios

• Serve immediately

At the restaurant we’re currently serving a smaller gooseberry and elderflower pavlova with thick custard, fresh cream and elderflower syrup sharp, soft and absolutely lovely when eaten on our sun drenched terrace. If turning the oven on feels ambitious right now, come and let us make pudding for you instead. Find a table here.

June is looking particularly delicious at Gina.

A few things are returning, a few things are brand new and one thing involves a truly dangerous amount of chocolate cake.

Here’s what’s happening this month:

Tuesday Steak Nights Are Back

After what felt like relentless requests (and some very persuasive DMs), our Tuesday Steak Nights are officially returning from June 2nd and this time they’re here to stay.

Every Tuesday evening we’ll have different steak cuts on the blackboard with different weights and prices depending on what we’ve got in that week.

And yes… the Hereford Beef Burger will be making an appearance too.

Honestly, this might be the best Tuesday you can have for miles. Find a table here

The Burger Is Staying Put

We’ve listened.

Our Hereford Beef Burger will now be available every Tuesday evening and every weekday lunch - this starts today to satisfy the half term crowd.

Still the same dry-aged Hereford beef.
Still the same excellent chips.
Still the same “Shall we order 2 or 3 for the table or one each?”

As always, numbers are limited daily so if you’re desperate for one, don’t leave it until 2:45pm.

P.s. If someone walks in and asks me to put pineapple in it i’m taking it off the menu.

Saturday Morning Bakery Pop-Ups

Every Saturday morning in June, we’re taking over the terrace with baked goods for takeaway.

9am–12pm (or until sold out).

Expect:
- Doughnuts
- Welsh cakes
- Our chocolate cake
- Mango chiffon cake
- Chocolate chip cookies
and a few extra bits depending on how organised the kitchen feels

An ideal way to gear yourself up for a walk in Epping Forest.

Gina Celebration Cakes

This one we’re very excited about.

From June 1st, you’ll be able to order Gina celebration cakes for collection or to enjoy in the restaurant with friends and family.

We’re starting with:
- Our famous chocolate cake in two sizes
- House chiffon cakes with seasonal fruit

More details will be landing on our website very soon.

Please use this information responsibly. Or irresponsibly. We support both.

As always, keep an eye on Instagram for reminders, menus and updates throughout the month. Find a table with us here

See you soon,
Rav & Team Gina

I got this particular job because the GM-to-be knew me from his time at Rochelle Canteen. I was working at St. JOHN then and shaking things up a bit with ice cream sandwiches, tea cakes, trotter-shaped chocolates and whatever else I could get away with. I’d since moved on and spent time in a few other kitchens when, one lunch break, I jogged over from my job at Jamavar in Mayfair - probably still smelling faintly of fried onions - to a nearby Joe & The Juice to meet the owner, Katya Davies, and future GM, Alcides Gauto. We sat there talking about British desserts, old-school baking and how pastry so often becomes an afterthought in restaurant kitchens. I remember leaving that meeting feeling completely energised by the idea of giving desserts real attention.

The kitchen itself was tiny. I had a single metal bench about two metres wide, a small Polar oven and an under-counter freezer. That was it. But I loved it.

Welsh cakes quickly became part of the daily rhythm of the place, alongside lemon loaf. Every morning I’d pull a tray of cut Welsh cakes from the fridge that i’d prepped the day before, fire up the plancha and cook them lightly in butter until the edges cooked and the centres softened. The smell was a good way to start the morning, it felt like a proper homely type of home. Right before the boys started firing up their various concoctions we had this moment of Welsh Cake smell and bliss. Our temp chefs offered no restraint and would almost always pinch one warm, rip it open and put a round of butter in it. It was their morning treat with a coffee.

The lemon loaf needed finishing too; a simple lemon pound cake made with double cream for softness, soaked in sharp lemon syrup while still warm and sealed with a thick lemon glaze that crackled ever so slightly when sliced.

We had a regular called Colin who came in almost every morning for tea and a slice of lemon loaf or two Welsh Cakes. Saturdays were my favourite though. I’d spend the morning filling the counter: datterini tomato tartlets, chocolate chip cookies, cherry and custard slices and stacks of Welsh cakes dusted in sugar. It felt abundant in a really fun way. I did it because I was encouraged to do it and because we all had a collective love of baked goods.

I’ve always thought Welsh cakes deserve more than being treated like a nostalgic afterthought. They should be eaten fresh, slightly crisp at the edges, split open and spread thickly with salted butter while still hot. At my bakery, they’d have pride of place on the counter. Maybe alongside jam in summer, maybe sold in bundles with pots of salty butter and always cooked fresh throughout the morning so you catch them at their absolute best.

For me, they represent the kind of baking I love most: humble, comforting and very homely. No trends, no unnecessary reinvention. Just something warm to eat with a cup of tea.

If you’d like to make your kitchen feel a little more homely, I’ve included the recipe below. Welsh cakes are surprisingly easy to make and quick to cook too. You don’t need fancy equipment, complicated ingredients or loads of space, and the dough can happily be made ahead of time. The most important thing is getting the cooking right. At home, I’d use a heavy cast iron pan or plate, heated low and slow so the heat spreads evenly across the surface. Traditionally, Welsh cakes are cooked on a bakestone, or maen, which gives them that distinctive golden crust and gentle, even bake.

I’ll be making them again every Saturday in June for our pop-up. You’ll find them at Gina from 9am until 12pm. I’ll also make them for our in person event which I will send a link to soon for all paid subscribers.

Welsh Cakes are Divine

Makes 12-14

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She called me afterwards, completely out of breath, and said:

“I LOVED IT.”

Tonight I’m recording an episode of Newsnight about hospitality.

Well, technically it won’t air for another two weeks because the government is currently such a mess that its in full crisis mode coverage. But still, the fact the conversation is happening is really important.

I’ll be alongside Tom Kerridge, Simon Rogan and Yotam Ottolenghi, all talking about different parts of what’s happening to hospitality in this country. VAT, staffing, community, local economies.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what I actually want to say.

Because we don’t own a huge restaurant group. We don’t have investors. We’re not backed by private equity. We are, like so many others, just a chef couple who wanted to open a restaurant in the place we live.

That’s it really.

People with a skill who had an ongoing dream. People trying to build something meaningful.

I’d like to say that a year in, everything is smooth and steady and professionally organised. In reality, I can’t quite believe we opened in the chaotic unpreparedness that we did. I look back now and think: poor naive us. Did we know the tidal wave that was about to hit us in the face? Absolutely not.

Have I had the most thrilling ride of my life doing this? Fuck yes.

Are we deeply anxious about the financial climate and the future of restaurants? Completely.

Running a restaurant is actually remarkably similar to having a newborn for the first time. You’re constantly anxious, permanently exhausted, running on adrenaline and surviving on meals eaten standing up or hunched over at strange hours of the night. The only difference is that with a baby you occasionally get rewarded with a sleepy cute contact nap or a tiny weird new quirk that makes you cry with love. Eating fast food at midnight after a brutal shift just doesn’t hit quite the same way it did when I was awake with Donnie in those early months.

My mum was our KP this weekend because our actual KP went on paternity leave. We paid him full leave, happily, timed so he could have a whole month with his newborn baby… only for him not to come back afterwards. Which, honestly, felt both totally devastating and extremely hospitality at the same time. Know what I mean?

My mum called me afterwards completely out of breath saying: “I LOVED IT.”

“What? Washing up?”

Yes. She loved it. As a lifelong clean obsessive she was absolutely in her element. And because one of our runners, Hamja was on shift, speaks Urdu, she attached herself to him immediately. Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, Gujarati - if you speak one of those languages my mum will find you and adopt you instantly.

That’s the thing I wish more people understood about independent restaurants. They are ecosystems of people holding each other up.

For the first six months after opening, my mum washed and ironed all our aprons at her home. My dad still helps us with our accounts, petty cash, GP reports and spending trackers before packaging them up neatly for our accountants. My brother works FOH shifts around his finance job, builds financial models for us and makes a point to tell us when we absolutely cannot spend money on something. He’s also annoyingly better with customers than I am, doesn’t get rattled and loves giving away free desserts.

If I’m completely in the shit, which happens regularly, my dad picks Donnie up from nursery. My best friend’s dad assembled a load of high chairs for us on a Friday night and brought them back the next morning ready to go. One of my closest friends is basically our 24-hour IT support line. Our AGM built my toddler tower last week because flatpack furniture makes me very confused.

And then there’s the team themselves. Watering the plants outside. Planting them in the first place. Caring about the space like it belongs to them too.

Because it does.

This restaurant has never felt like “my business”. It feels like a collective effort by people who want something nice to exist on our high street.

Which is why I find the current conversation around hospitality so frustrating.

Restaurants, pubs and cafes are constantly spoken about like they’re luxuries. Optional extras. Nice little lifestyle businesses.

But when independent hospitality disappears, what disappears with it?

Jobs disappear.
First jobs disappear.
Community disappears.
A reason to be on the high street disappears.

You notice it immediately when an area loses its independent businesses. A place starts to feel quieter, emptier and less alive.

The hardest part is that so many of us are trying to do the “right” thing.

All of these things; employing people properly, paying fairly, buying responsibly, supporting local producers, creating nice environments to work in. Are so crucial to what we do.

But the economics are becoming harder and harder to make work.

The rise in Employer National Insurance has had a huge impact on labour-heavy industries like hospitality. And hospitality is uniquely labour-heavy. We cannot function without people. A restaurant cannot automate itself into existence.

At the same time, all the costs around us continue to rise: wages, produce, rent, utilities, suppliers. You know the deal.

At some point there is simply nothing left at the end.

Profit has somehow become a dirty word in this conversation when actually profit is what allows businesses to survive sustainably. Profit is fixing the fridge when it breaks, or the burst dishwasher pipe we were dealing with this morning. It’s giving someone a pay rise. It’s replacing broken furniture. It’s opening another site and employing more people. It’s having enough breathing room to keep going.

A customer recently messaged me saying how much she loved her meal, but suggested we should upgrade the terrace furniture. Fair enough. But a new terrace setup could easily cost £7k. People often imagine restaurants are sitting on endless cash, when in reality every repair, improvement or investment comes from whatever tiny margin is left at the end.

Without it, businesses stagnate.
Then they disappear.

One of the things that worries me most is young people.

We get asked incredibly frequently if we can hire local teenagers for their first jobs. Hospitality is one of the few industries where someone can walk in with no qualifications and genuinely build a life for themselves. But training inexperienced staff costs time, money and labour, and the gap between youth wages and adult wages has narrowed so sharply that independent businesses are finding it harder and harder to absorb those costs.

I want to hire them.
I increasingly understand why people can’t.

At a moment where AI is already replacing so many entry-level jobs elsewhere, it feels completely backwards that we are making it harder to employ actual humans.

I’m not writing this because I think restaurants deserve sympathy. We chose this life. And despite everything, I still love it deeply.

I love feeding people.
I love our regulars.
I love a busy Friday night.
I love watching shy young staff members grow in confidence.
I love seeing local people use the restaurant as part of their weekly lives.
I love that in this tiny pocket of an unassuming high street, we somehow built somewhere people want to be.

I just think independent hospitality needs to be seen properly and understood for what it really is: a network of people, livelihoods, communities and first chances, all holding each other together.

Once those places disappear, they rarely come back.

If you’ve read this and you’re wondering what you can actually do with all of this, the answer is quite simple.

Use your local high street.

Go to the independent cafe instead of ordering another takeaway chain coffee. Book the neighbourhood restaurant you keep meaning to try. Buy the loaf of bread from the bakery. Go to the pub quiz (or the psychic night!). Tell your friends about the places you love. Keep showing up for the businesses that make your area feel like somewhere people actually live, not just pass through.

Because independent hospitality survives through habit as much as anything else.

I know money is tight for everyone right now. I know eating out has become more expensive we are all feeling it. However, I also know that once independent places disappear, they are incredibly hard to bring back.

What’s left is usually emptier, quieter and much less human.

I think a lot about the ecosystem we’ve accidentally built in this tiny corner of our high street. The staff, the farmers, growers, the runners, the regulars, the families, the people watering plants outside, my mum chatting away in various languages while washing up, the Friday night noise, the feeling that something alive is happening in there.

That’s the thing worth protecting.

Not just restaurants.
People.

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If you enjoyed this read or it resonated with you please ‘restack,’ send to a friend and share with others. If you’ve got a local business that you like supporting and want to shout about tell me about them in the comments! One of my favourites is our local locksmith Tony and our Cobbler by the station who has fixed many of my shoes.

P.s. Newsnight airs on the 28th of May!

Chips.

I think, as a food group, I could eat chips every single day. In fact, I suspect I probably do. If you tracked my eating over the course of a year, I wouldn’t be surprised if chips appeared in some form in about 80% of it. Not always as the main meal, sometimes just a few on the side, sometimes stolen off someone else’s plate, sometimes standing in the kitchen before service.

When I was pregnant for the first time, I ate them almost daily. Always on my own (weep), always covered in an obscene amount of vinegar. I’d go to Wilsons, my local chip shop, and ask them to wrap them tight so the vinegar would steam into the potato. It would leave this brown line running through the chip, just under the skin, properly soaked in. That’s how I liked them.

There’s something about chips that feels both deeply personal and completely universal. My friends who know me laugh at my love of chips, they know that I will always want to order MORE chips out of fear that we won’t have enough. I like an abundant amount of them, I don’t want to act politely around them.

What makes a perfect chip?

I think the idea of a “perfect chip” is slightly misleading, because it really depends on context.

Where you are, what you’re eating it with, how hungry you are, even the time of day - all of that changes what you actually want from a chip. The chip you crave wrapped in paper, soaked in vinegar on a cold afternoon is not the same chip you want alongside a piece of grilled fish, or next to something rich that needs cutting through.

For me though, at its best, a chip is about contrast.

A crisp outer shell that shatters slightly when you bite into it, giving way to something soft, fluffy and almost collapsing in the centre. Not dry, not waxy. It should feel like it’s just holding itself together.

Colour matters too. Not pale, not aggressively dark. Somewhere in that golden space where you know it’s going to be crisp but not bitter.

We cut ours thick. Thick ish kind of, long and in the middle. Thin chips have their place, but I think thicker-cut chips give you that contrast properly, especially when you’re eating them with other things and need something to carry sauces, to mop, to drag through whatever’s on the plate.

I always think about those thick Cypriot chips made with Cyprus potatoes, fried for a while, often a bit irregular, sometimes with the skin on. They’re not delicate. They’re built for eating with grilled meats, with oregano, with lemon, with something smoky and salty. They properly hold their own. You need that kind of chip in that setting. Chef Selin Kiazim used to make the best chips at her former London restaurant, Oklava. I miss that place.

And then there’s seasoning. Fine salt, while they’re hot, tossed properly not sprinkled timidly over the top. Chips need confidence!

The reality of chips in a restaurant

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You go to a supermarket instead and yes, it hits the spot, but then you turn the packet over and think… why is all of that in there?

This is the kind of cake I wish was easier to find. Soft for days, quick to put together, and adaptable depending on what fruit you have. The sort of thing you cut into whenever you want something comforting, no occasion needed.

In my dream version of a bakery, there would always be trays of fruit crumble cake on the counter. Still slightly warm, generous slices, nothing too polished. It gets me every time.

This is one of those cakes you end up making again and again. It comes together quickly, works across seasons, and manages to please just about everyone; fruit lovers, crumble people, and those who simply want a slice of something soft and buttery. It’s just as good served as cake as it is warm for pudding, with custard on the side.

You can make it your own depending on what’s in season. Raspberries, blackberries, cherries, figs or plums all work beautifully. Chop larger fruit into bite-sized pieces and leave smaller ones whole. If you’re using apples or pears, peel them first and cut them down a little so they soften nicely as the cake bakes.

Blackberry Crumble Cake & Pistachio Custard

Serves: 8
Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
Tin: 24 x 24cm (9.5 x 9.5in square)
Equipment: Stand mixer or electric whisk, mixing bowls, baking tin

Cake
230g unsalted butter, soft
20ml neutral oil
220g golden caster sugar
Pinch of Maldon salt
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
4 eggs
200g self-raising flour
½ tsp baking powder
30g ground almonds

Fruit
300g blackberries (or other fruit, see notes above)

Crumble topping
30g pistachios, roughly chopped
40g demerara sugar
30g plain flour
20ml double cream

Pistachio custard (optional)
250ml whole milk
250ml double cream
100g caster sugar
Pinch of Maldon salt
5 egg yolks
20g pistachio paste

Method: Cake

1. Preheat the oven to 160°C fan / 180°C. Grease and line your tin with baking parchment.

2. Cream the butter, oil and sugar together until pale and fluffy.

3. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well between each addition. Stir in the salt and vanilla.

4. Fold in the flour, baking powder and ground almonds until just combined.

5. Spoon the batter into the tin and smooth the surface. Scatter over the fruit.

Crumble topping

6. Mix together the pistachios, flour and demerara sugar.

7. Add the cream and use your fingertips to bring it together into small clumps- don’t overwork it.

8. Scatter evenly over the fruit and cake batter.

Bake

9. Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

10. Leave to cool in the tin before removing.

This will keep for 3–4 days in an airtight container. Serve as it is, or warm with custard, cream or ice cream.

Pistachio custard

1. Heat the milk, cream, salt and half the sugar in a saucepan until just steaming.

2. In a bowl, whisk the egg yolks, pistachio paste and remaining sugar.

3. Slowly pour about two-thirds of the hot milk over the yolks, whisking constantly.

4. Return the mixture to the pan with the remaining milk.

5. Cook over a low heat, stirring continuously, until it thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon.

Serve warm alongside the cake.

If you enjoyed this one please like, share, ‘restack’, comment. More recipes and thoughts to come soon.

And then there’s the wheat. Grown, milled, and turned into the kind of bread that makes you stop in your tracks.

I love this country for its bakeries. I’m a full-on supporter - I go out of my way for them, spend far too much in them, and rarely walk past one without coming out with something in hand. A bit of a fiend, if I’m honest.

So, after the response to my eating out newsletter, I thought I’d share something I’ve been adding to: a bakery map. It’s a running list you can save to Google Maps for those moments when the pull hits and you suddenly need to be in a bakery.

The difference with this one is that I haven’t been to all of them (yet). It includes places I’m curious about as well as ones I already love. I’ll keep adding to it as I go.

Below you’ll find a few that are top of mind right now including what I think you should order if you go -not necessarily better than the rest, just the ones I can’t stop thinking about at the moment. You’ll also find the link to my work in progress map that I will keep adding to.

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Don’t ask me how I convinced the chefs to agree. It only took six weeks of gentle persuasion, prodding, a bit of lobbying, and some very strategic seed planting.

But it’s happening.

The Original Gina Burger.
The “burger for the table”.
The one that divided opinion.
The one someone asked to put pineapple in.
The one that made people angry.

It’s back for 4 services.

No frills. Just a single, semi-smashed patty with cheese, pickles and sauce - exactly as we like it.

Best ordered on a Spring Tuesday night, with chips and something cold on the side.

And yes, you should probably finish with a doughnut.

See you next Tuesday??

Find a table here and join us for a burger for the month of May

P.s. Thank you to everyone who joined us for April’s steak nights. A real success and a pleasure to host.

P.P.S. Available on the blackboard alongside our à la carte menu - as you like it.

Today, I wanted to touch upon the finer complexities of opening a bakery and offer a bit more clarity on why we didn’t do it.

Part of this series has been me trying to understand that decision in real time, and to take you along with me as I figure it out.

Because the site next door has become a bit of a strange symbol of what could have been.

You know when you see your ex and they look a bit dishevelled, and you can’t quite help but feel… fine about it all? Not smug exactly. Just… reassured.

That’s how I feel every time I glance over at the dusty zebra carpet and those velvet booth seats next door.

Relief.

It’s the best thing I never had.

And my goodness does it feel glorious.

I feel like I’ve won on time, i’ve won a tremendous amount of energy. Maybe even won at life a little bit.

Even in my last accountant meeting, which was essentially a very expensive dressing down (FFS!), there was a moment where a finger was pointed next door and I got:
“And aren’t you f*n glad you didn’t take that on?” The truth is: yes. Completely.

Because well, the climate for independent hospitality right now is… bad. Not “a bit tricky”. Not “challenging”. Just bad.

I think we need to be more honest about that.

At the moment, in the UK, we’re on the verge of seeing six hospitality venues close every single day. That’s without support from the UK Gov. Last year, at the start it was 2 per day, and towards the end of last year, that number crept up to four closures a day. (The Independent)

Since the pandemic, the sector has lost around 16,000 venues overall, and it’s now significantly smaller than it was in 2020. (UKHospitality)

The tricky thing is, you can’t ever fully foresee this stuff.

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We lean on them all year round. They sit on menus, expected to deliver every single time. Mash. Chips. Roasties. Dauphinoise. Boulangère. No one really questions them. No one asks if they’re okay. They’re just there.

But they shouldn’t be taken for granted.

Potatoes are properly seasonal. And they change more than people realise, more than I initially realised.

The flavour shifts, the water content shifts, the sugar levels creep up and down depending on how they’ve been grown and stored. Cold storage, in particular, converts starch into sugar, which is where things start to go wrong. That’s when your beautiful roast potatoes suddenly burn too quickly, take on that overly dark colour, and collapse into something disappointingly soft. It’s not bad cooking though. It’s chemistry.

In the UK, we grow over 5 million tonnes of potatoes each year, across more than 100 varieties. Most of them never make it onto a menu by name. They get reduced to “roast potatoes” or “chips” or “mash”, as if they’re interchangeable but they’re not.

In spring, you start to see Jersey Royals. They’re grown only on the island of Jersey, on steep coastal slopes known as côtils, often still harvested by hand. They have a protected status, like Champagne. Their flavour is grassy, slightly nutty, almost mineral. You don’t really need to do much to them. Butter, salt, maybe some soft herbs.

Then there are new potatoes, which are essentially young potatoes pulled early before their sugars fully convert into starch. They’re waxy, delicate, and hold their shape. These are not for mash. They’re for boiling gently and eating with too much butter.

Pink Fir Potatoes are the odd ones but I love to eat them. Knobbly, slightly awkward looking, with a firm, waxy texture and a nutty flavour. They’re brilliant in salads, or anything where you want definition and bite. They work nicely steamed, cooled, squished a bit and deep fried.

At home, we’re obsessed with Cyprus potatoes. Grown in mineral-rich red soil, which actually stains their skins slightly. They’re waxy but not too waxy, and somehow make the best chips. Crisp edges, fluffy inside, with a depth of flavour that feels like more than just potato.

All of this matters more than we like to admit because when potatoes go wrong, they really go wrong!

We’ve had a bit of a battle with them at the restaurant. Sunday roasties, in particular, have p*ssed us off, a lot. Every week, we get kilos delivered. The team preps them the same way. Peel, cut, steam until just tender, then let them cool properly so they dry out. Everything you’re meant to do. Everything that should guarantee success.

And then they go into the oven. Sometimes they come out perfect, 9 times out of 10. Golden, crisp, shattering at the edges. Sometimes they turn on you and it’s a complete shocker.

They brown too quickly, almost aggressively. The sugars in the potato caramelise too fast, before the structure has had a chance to set. They collapse and disintegrate. What you’re left with is something closer to mush than a roast potato. I quite like to eat these but they are difficult to serve with the justification that it’s just the type of potato rather than our cooking ability!

We’ve had services where we simply couldn’t serve them. Which feels ok until you’re the one standing there explaining to guests that we have had to swap roast potatoes for chips that service. Trust me, you do not want to F with British customers and their roast potatoes. I thought someone was going to cry when I went over to talk about a chip / roast potato substitute.

I get it. A roast without roast potatoes is not really a roast is it?

On mash and the uncomfortable truth about it fat percentages.

Let’s talk about mash. Good mash should feel excessive. It should feel like you’ve gone a bit too far, and then decided to keep going anyway. It’s funny, my parents love mash potato and always complain that there’s isn’t as good as Matties but my father, health sensitive and constantly worrying about eating too much fat. I don’t really have the heart to tell him that Mattie’s secret is that he has no boundaries or limitations when it comes to fat for flavour.

So yeah, that texture people chase, that silky, almost glossy finish, that sense that it’s coating your mouth in the most comforting way possible… that’s fat. A lot of it.

Butter, cream, whole milk, sometimes all three in quantities that would make your heart flutter.

There are different approaches in kitchens. Some roast the potatoes whole in their skins to drive off moisture and concentrate flavour before scooping out the flesh. Some steam them to control water content more precisely. Some boil them, which is the most common method, but also the one that introduces the most risk of water logging.

Whatever the method, the goal is the same. You want the driest possible cooked potato before you start adding anything back in. Then it’s about how you handle it.

A ricer or a drum sieve if you want it perfectly smooth. A chinois if you’re really pushing it to that ultra-refined place. And then, slowly, butter. It needs to emulsify, not seize. Warm milk or cream follows, just enough to loosen it without tipping it into something soupy.

Season properly. More than you think. And then stop. Before it turns gluey. Before you overwork it and break the starch. The best mash sits somewhere between structure and collapse. It holds just enough shape on the plate, but the moment you touch it, it gives way. My grandmother liked mash.

It should feel indulgent and perhaps slightly ridiculous. Like an ocean of fat, in the best possible way. Below i’ve put together 3 staple mash recipes because I have no doubt that you’ll now be craving a potato, in some way or form.

3 Stellar Mash Recipes

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Somewhere along the line I’ve become a sort of eating travel agent for people I know (and people they know too). I regularly get messages like: “somewhere delicious, quick and easy by Bank any ideas?” or “taking someone on a date in South, where shall we go?”

I genuinely love digging around in my brain and pulling places out, hoping that people feel as good as I did when I first went. There’s something very satisfying about sending someone somewhere and it being well received.

So I thought I’d start putting together a list here for you too- broken down into those common situations we all find ourselves in. When I’ve built up another batch, I’ll send more.

Also, a reminder that I have a Google map of London restaurants that lives here - in case you want to explore that way. A couple I know messaged me recently to say their hobby is working their way through it, which really amused me. I try to update it as quickly as I can after a genuinely good meal. I’m quite strict with it… if I don’t really like somewhere, it doesn’t go on... Sorry!

Here are the categories i’ll be breaking down:

• Going with the family (needs variety, low stress, something for everyone)

• Cute date night or an intimate catch-up

• Dining with kids (no fuss, but still good)

• A place to celebrate

• Going out with chefs

Let’s start here:

Going with the family (needs variety, low stress, something for everyone)

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Every bakery, every supermarket, every brand wants their version to be the one. Have you seen what M&S are doing this year? They’ve fully leaned in; red velvet, tiramisu, even cheese. They’re basically the market leaders of “how far can we push a British staple product before it stops being one”. And honestly, I get it. It’s fun, it gets attention, and people love a twist on something familiar.

At the same time, I keep coming back to the original, always.

Soft, spiced, slightly sticky, toasted just enough, and then absolutely drowned in salted butter so it melts straight through the middle. That first bite is unbeatable. It’s nostalgic in a way that’s hard to recreate with something trend-led. Plus, I adore dried fruit.

Hot cross buns go way back, centuries back, tied to Easter and marked with that cross to symbolise the occasion. They were never meant to be overworked or overthought, just made well and shared. I keep thinking about how normal it used to be to walk to your local bakery and pick up a squidgy pack. Percy Ingle maybe, or for me a little place called Pithers- proper neighbourhood spots where you didn’t need a concept or a headline flavour to get people through the door. They were just part of your day to day.

I don’t know if we’ll ever really go back to that. Everything feels bigger now, louder, more elaborate. Bakeries included. And I’m part of that too, because in my head I’m already thinking… what would I serve?

Probably a very good, very classic hot cross bun. And then something slightly ridiculous alongside it, maybe a maple smoked banana bread butter, thickly spread through the middle and toasted, of course. Because maybe that’s where I land on it all. Respect the original, but don’t pretend I don’t love a bit of excess as well.

Anyway, these buns sit firmly in the “do it properly” camp. Really soft, really light, using the same method we used for the doughnuts last time to get that fluffy, almost cloud-like texture. The kind that feels like it barely weighs anything in your hand.

Let’s make them shall we?

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We’ve been trying not to make this a thing.

But the truth is, since opening Gina, steak has quietly become a thing.

It started with the Wing Rib, a few regulars ordering it week in, week out and then escalated with the Tournedos Rossini, which you all seemed to love as much as we did. Since then, the question has been fairly constant: what other cuts have you got?

The short answer is: not enough.

Not because we don’t want to. But because running a small kitchen means everything is a negotiation. Space, storage, what we prioritise. At one point recently, we stood back and realised an entire fridge is dedicated to sourdough (weep), which leaves less room for, say, an ever-rotating selection of steaks.

Then there’s the reality of beef itself. Prices have climbed sharply over the last few years - in some cases by 30–40% depending on the cut - which makes it harder to keep it on the menu in a way that feels sensible, both for us and for you.

And we still want to be a restaurant that offers more than just beef.

So instead of forcing it into the margins, we’ve decided to give it its own space.

For three Tuesdays in April, we’re running Steak Nights at Gina

14th, 21st, 28th.

We’ve worked with Swaledale to source a range of cuts that we can offer properly, and we’ll be putting them up on the board each week depending on what’s best.

Think Sirloin, Ribeye, Bavette with our favourite sauces and sides; Green Peppercorn Sauce, Café De Paris Butter, Béarnaise (my personal favourite). A few lighter things to start, and desserts that lean a little indulgent. We’ve been testing a bannoffee that hits all the right notes - cold, soft, crunchy, and slightly impossible to stop eating.

It’s simple, but done with intent.

Find a table here

Subscribers get a discount too, find it below:

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Over the past few months, I’ve noticed a shift in how people in hospitality are speaking. Not the usual background stress, but something sharper, more urgent. Conversations that once happened quietly are now out in the open, and with a level of honesty that feels new.

I was sitting with a restaurateur friend recently talking about December numbers. I told her our profit and said, “really? all of that work for that?”

She laughed. “That’s what you made? Ours was less.”

This is a restaurant that, from the outside, looks far more successful than ours. Busier, more established, better located. The kind of place you assume is doing incredibly well. It made me realise how misaligned perception and reality have become.

What things look like from the outside and what they actually are financially are, perhaps more than ever, completely different.

That is going to get a lot worse after April.

Minimum wage is rising, employer National Insurance is increasing, and VAT remains at 20%. None of these are new in isolation, but together they are creating a level of pressure many businesses simply won’t be able to absorb. We will see more closures.

This is why you’re seeing people speak out. It’s everywhere - news, podcasts, social media. There’s a new wave of transparency building across the industry.

I’m sure you can already feel it as a customer. Eating out is more expensive, and people are doing it less, I know that I am. Not because restaurants have suddenly become greedy, but because costs have risen so significantly that prices have had to follow.

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Seeing as it’s rhubarb season I wanted to share the zingiest rhubarb and apple compote that we devoured here at Gina. I made doughnuts 5 separate times for the team to get their opinions and also to spread joy.

Traditionally it’s very British to fill a doughnut with custard or jam. So here i’d like to do both. I’ve also got a ganache glazed version for you to try too. Boston cream pie style.

In this newsletter you will find a recipe for:

Rhubarb & apple compote

A classic vanilla custard

Boston cream pie filled doughnuts

All of which utilise the base dough recipe that we worked with last week.

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The way we discover restaurants has changed completely in the last few years, and I’m not sure we’ve really talked about what we might have lost along the way.

This is a small musing about social media, dopamine hits, and whether the first bite of a meal is still really the first bite.

The other day I realised something slightly depressing about eating out.

Before I go to almost any restaurant now, I’ve already seen the food. I’ve seen the plates, the interiors, the dishes cut open, someone taking a bite and nodding approvingly.

By the time I sit down, I feel like I’ve already been there.

Somewhere along the way, the first bite stopped being the first bite.

The thought came to me while I was sitting with a friend doing something we do a lot: working out where we might go and eat. These days it usually happens somewhere between train rides, coffee runs and chasing my two-year-old around whichever part of London we’ve ended up in that weekend.

My weekends most definitely revolve around him now. Play somewhere, run around, see something new, then find somewhere to eat.

My friend started suggesting restaurants. And every single time she mentioned a place, my brain pulled up an image of it. Not just the restaurant itself, but the food. Sometimes a short video clip of someone cutting into something. Sometimes someone taking a bite and closing their eyes with approval. Often an opinion attached to it too - worth the hype, not worth the hype, best thing I’ve eaten this year.

I stopped her halfway through and thought, woah.

I’ve already seen all of this.

Before I’ve even walked through the door.

And I suddenly realised something that made me a bit sad. Eating out rarely excites me in the way it once did. Not because the food is worse, London has never been better for restaurants. But because I’ve often already experienced the place in fragments through someone else’s phone.

The surprise has gone.

For a long time, the joy of eating out was the unknown. You might have heard a friend say the pasta was good, or maybe you’d read a short review somewhere, but that was about it. The discovery happened at the table.

Now we often arrive already knowing the best dishes, the lighting, the tables, the angle of the room, the thing to order and the thing to avoid. It’s a bit like watching spoilers for a series before you’ve finished.

And I don’t think we talk enough about how that changes the experience.

Before I sound like I’m complaining from the sidelines, I should say that I’m very much a cog in this machine too. I’ve posted food online and I still do. I’ve shared restaurants and dishes and I’ve benefited from the ecosystem social media has created from both sides. Look at my bloody Instagram. I shout about meals I’ve had and promote my own restaurant. Sigh. I’m hardly innocent in all this.

Restaurants benefit enormously from it as well. One viral video can fill a dining room for weeks. One Keith Lee review and suddenly a place is rammed.

So I get it. I really do.

But I do sometimes wonder what we’ve traded away.

Last week I went somewhere I really love: Cafe Cecilia.

It’s one of those places that feels calming to me, from the moment I sit down. The room is simple, stripped back, almost effortless in the way it’s put together. Nothing feels over designed. The tables are straightforward, the space is serene.

I was there with my husband and biz partner, Mattie, which means there’s almost always some sort of disagreement at the table. Work, life, plans, logistics it all blends together. We had a small bicker about something I can’t even remember now, and then, as usual, we made up quickly. Mattie is very good at that. He likes to make up immediately. I like that about him.

We ordered Guinness bread, Onglet and chips, squash ravioli and deep-fried bread and butter pudding.

Halfway through the meal, a man sat down at the table next to us.

From his bag he took out a black stick and set it up slightly to the right of the table. On top of it he fixed a camera. Directly in front of him he placed another camera, and in his hands was his phone.

Through the entire meal he ate towards the lens.

Bite. Expression. Reaction.

He sat alone while he performed the experience for an audience that wasn’t in the room.

It was strange watching him. Not in a judgemental way, more in a curious way. I found myself wondering if some of the expressions were a bit false, or at least slightly exaggerated. I didn’t have quite the same reactions he did.

I love Cafe Cecilia, but I also know that my love for it isn’t just about the food arriving at the table. I’m fond of the space. I’m fond of the chef. I’m fond of the memories I’ve had there before. I like the feeling of walking in knowing I’m going to eat something good.

Restaurants are often emotional places like that. They build meaning over time.

Watching him, I also had the strange sense that he felt slightly uncomfortable doing what he was doing, but that discomfort was being overridden by something else- the small dopamine hit that comes from posting something and watching the views roll in.

We’ve all been there in some form or another.

At one point my own dining companion was getting on my nerves again, but I caught myself thinking something quite funny: I’d still rather be mildly irritated by the person sitting opposite me than eating for strangers right now.

Lately I’ve been thinking more about how much of the world we experience second-hand. We watch other people travel somewhere. We watch them eat somewhere, we look at where they sleep, where they bathe. We watch their reaction to it. And then we decide whether we want to experience it ourselves.

It’s strange when you step back from it.

I think about it even more now because my son often sits on my lap when I’m perhaps tempted to pick my phone up. The thing that always stops me is wondering whether I want him to learn about the world through a screen first, or through the world itself.

Of course, there’s another side to all of this. Social media has opened up food in incredible ways. We can see dishes and places we might never encounter in our lifetime. We can learn about cultures and cooking techniques from all over the world. And for small restaurants, that exposure can be life-changing.

Exposure used to be controlled by a small group of critics and publications. Now anyone can shine a light on a place they love. That democratisation is important to point out.

So this isn’t a complaint about food influencers existing.

It’s more of a pondering thought.

When I think back to meals that really stayed with me, one thing is usually true: I didn’t know exactly what was coming.

I remember the feeling of surprise. Of something arriving at the table and thinking, what is that? When I went to The Park last year, it was my friends birthday and for dessert they brought over a massive mound of candy floss - totally unexpected and really fun.

Now the algorithm often shows us everything before we get there, perhaps if I had seen that candy floss before I got there I wouldn’t have enjoyed it as much.

Sometimes I wonder if the magic of the first-time experience is slowly being eroded. Not intentionally. Just gradually. By a thousand videos of the same dish.

Maybe the answer isn’t to reject it all.

Maybe it’s just to occasionally walk into somewhere without doing the research.

No reels.
No TikToks.
No rankings.

Just a table, a menu and the thrill of not quite knowing what’s about to arrive.

Because I’d quite like to feel that first bite again.

For the first time…

I’m curious - tell me, when was the last time you went somewhere to eat without looking it up first? And how was it?
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If you enjoyed this piece, feel free to share it with someone who loves eating out.

They’re surprisingly hard to find done well and I understand why.

I think I’d hate producing them in the long run. I’ve done it before and it didn’t put me off eating them. It just made me realise how demanding they are. The production. The oil. The oil. The oil… The timing. The maintenance. They’re needy little things.

Of course, that place was St. JOHN - at the time, the pinnacle of the British doughnut. The bakery has evolved massively since those early days. What began with smaller fryers and hand-rolled doughnuts became a precise operation: a machine portioning and rolling tight balls of dough, a fryer that flipped them automatically and lifted them neatly onto racks to drain.

The bakery produced hundreds a day. Sugared. Filled. Vanilla custard, seasonal jams, chocolate custard, salted caramel, hazelnut custard. Fergus led the flavours, always classic, never ‘too racy.’

I learnt a lot about doughnuts there.

(Without additives) They have a shelf life of one day. Maximum.
From a commercial standpoint, that’s brutal. Whatever isn’t sold is waste. You can’t stretch them into tomorrow. (Although they do make the BEST bread and butter pudding).

The restaurants were sent doughnuts unfilled and unsugared so they could be finished fresh on site. Because sugar, while delicious, pulls moisture from the dough over time. It dries them out.

If I opened a bakery next door to Gina, I’d dream of selling doughnuts. I’d be fearful of the oil - changing it, managing it, the smell of it. We’d need serious extraction so the windows didn’t fog and we didn’t walk around smelling like a chip shop.

I’d probably run them as weekend specials. Demand would need to justify the waste. I’ve thought about the footfall. I’d keep them as a staple: a pillowy sugared ring doughnut or small fluffy pillows. Stacked high. Fried throughout the day so they’re warm. Specials would include filled versions, seasonal compotes, dips and scoops of homemade ice cream. Sigh.

Let’s talk about softness and work on a recipe, because that’s what separates a good doughnut from a great one.

How we keep doughnuts soft

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It’s become a running theme, even now - in interviews, in Q&As, from customers, in my DMs. As if it’s an inevitability.

The truth is, I’ve come very close before. Close enough to learn a lesson that changed how I approach business entirely.

This bakery series isn’t just about recipes or nostalgia. It’s about the mechanics behind the romance.
The landscape of bakeries has changed so much. We’re lucky in the UK to have beautiful spaces run by people who care deeply about heritage grains, traditional methods, working with small growers and preserving skill. They feel like small acts of resistance. Microcosms of knowledge being protected. Landrace bakery, Quince Bakery, E5 Bakehouse, The Dusty Knuckle, Lannan, the list goes on…

It’s easy to fall in love with the romance of a bakery.

The reality of operating one is something else entirely. It can be relentless. It can chip away at the dream if you’re not careful. Just like the restaurant has in some ways.

Sometimes I wonder whether preserving the romance is safer. Whether it’s nicer to hold the idea in your hands rather than put it through the machinery of real life.

A few years ago, I came very close.

I had an idea for a small, focused bakery concept for a very long time, i’d talk about it with fellow chefs, i’d draw the logo on all of my notebooks. It was rooted in my love of layers, of choux buns, of dough that transforms under heat. I could see it clearly. It felt playful and precise and entirely mine.

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