CUB
Restaurant · Hoxton ·
Zero-waste tasting menu with inventive cocktails and plant-based dishes
Zero-waste tasting menu with inventive cocktails and plant-based dishes
"A minimalist, zero-waste, fermentation-focused restaurant on Hoxton Street announced closure on 7 August 2020 because one-metre social distancing was unworkable in the space and the pandemic exposed frailties in supply chains and the business model." - James Hansen
"Opened in autumn 2017 by multi-award-winning bartender Ryan Chetiyawardana with chef Doug McMaster and Dr Arielle Johnson, this 35-cover restaurant-bar permanently closed after lockdown when one-metre social distancing made the small space untenable. The project was explicitly designed to challenge conventional food systems: McMaster led a modern, chef-driven approach to minimising waste through reuse, upcycling and intercepting energy otherwise spent on recycling, while Dr Johnson brought research experience from Noma and the MAD Symposium. Safety concerns around experimenting with some ‘weirder’ ingredients, the venue’s niche, destination nature as the group’s first full food offering, and the ill-timed economic hit from Covid—compounded by a perceived lack of governmental engagement on food and drink stability—left continued operation impractical. Four full-time staff were made redundant but the owners have tried to help reassign them (McMaster offered roles at his London project), and the founders expressed hope that the restaurant’s principles—empowerment, re-shaping value and luxury, human and ecological sustainability, and using food, drink, music and community to bring happiness—can persist in future work." - Adam Coghlan
"A small restaurant opened in summer 2017 as a collaboration between Doug McMaster and celebrated bartender Ryan Chetiyawardana, where McMaster has been spending time recently. Its sustainability approach contrasts with McMaster’s zero‑waste project by focusing on working within existing structures and challenging assumptions about food systems — from rural farming and stratified supply chains to the idea that culinary luxury depends solely on the most expensive ingredients." - James Hansen
"The Hoxton restaurant from Ryan Chetiyawardana and Doug McMaster has appointed Michael Thompson, formerly of Fera at Claridge’s, as head chef as Fera prepares to make way for a new Claridge’s restaurant." - James Hansen
"In among the concoctions at Cub — think tinctures of chicken feather or a beeswax Old Fashioned — there’s a December mystery malt being sold off by the £10 dram. All in aid of charity CALM, which provides support for men in mental health crisis. It’s only the most recent in a long line of powerful initiatives from this extremely conscious kitchen and the wider Mr Lyan community." - Virginia Hartley