Camille team to open Penhale’s, a tribute to chef’s grandmother, in Farringdon

The team behind Borough Market restaurant Camille will open a new 66-cover restaurant, B. Penhale, at 57 West Smithfield in Farringdon in October, serving a menu built around the regional cooking traditions of Britain and Ireland and whole-carcass butchery.

Known as Penhale’s, the restaurant comes from restaurateurs Clare Lattin, Ratnesh Bagdai and Tom Hill, with Elliot Hashtroudi as chef patron. Hashtroudi will continue in his role as executive chef at Camille, where he has built a reputation for seasonal British produce, direct relationships with farmers and nose-to-tail cooking.

The name is a personal one. Indeed, the restaurant is named after Hashtroudi’s grandmother, Betty Penhale, a home cook whose family history is tied to Smithfield Market, a few steps from the new site. His maternal great-grandmother worked as a butcher at the market.

The Grade II-listed building has a long restaurant history, having previously housed the Michelin-starred French restaurant Club Gascon and, before that, a Lyon’s Tea House. “I wish the Camille team and their opening of Penhale’s the same success that Club Gascon had over a generation,” noted chef Pascal Aussignac, who ran Club Gascon at the address.

The space will be divided between a 60-cover dining room, laid with white tablecloths, and a separate six-seat bar. The bar will run a rotating chalkboard menu available only to walk-ins, meaning diners without a booking have somewhere to go. The dining room draws on the dishes and rituals of Victorian dining, while the bar menu takes a wider view of the period, looking at how migration has shaped the food of Britain and Ireland.

Dishes on the main menu will be listed with details of the regions they come from, giving diners an indication of their origins. As at Camille, whole-carcass butchery will underpin the cooking, with offal and lesser-known cuts appearing throughout.

Camille’s head of wine, Max Hancock, will oversee the drinks list. The focus will be on British winemakers, both those working in Britain and Ireland and those making wine abroad, with the rest of the list reflecting the pours and regions that were popular in Britain during the Victorian era.

Hashtroudi grew up in Dorset and moved to London to study English before starting to cook professionally in his early twenties. He spent three and a half years with Tim Siadatan at Padella and Trullo before joining St. John in Farringdon in 2020, where he worked closely with British farmers and absorbed the restaurant’s nose-to-tail approach. He has also run pop-ups and residencies across London, including a six-month stint at 107, formerly P Franco. He was appointed head chef of Camille in February 2024.

Penhale’s will open Monday dinner through to Sunday lunch.

Food Desk

For further updates, visit B. Penhale’s website here.