Former Racine chef Henry Harris behind relaunch of The Truscott Arms

A big-name restaurateur is overseeing the rebirth of the Sunday Roast pub
Calling time: The Truscott Arms as was
Rikesh Sudra
Ben Norum11 August 2017

Sometimes London’s restaurant scene feels like a small world.

The man behind one of London’s most popular French restaurants will now oversee the return of Maida Vale gastropub The Truscott Arms, which was known for serving the capital’s best Sunday Roast until it was forced to close last year due to a rent hike.

Henry Harris, who was owner and chef patron of Knightsbridge restaurant Racine until its own closure back in 2015, has been named the new director of the pub after it was bought by a private equity company.

Racine ran for 12 years on Brompton Road, drawing in celebrity diners as well as the food community.

Harris said: “The Truscott Arms has always been a neighbourhood pub – somewhere people love to go to enjoy food and drink with one another. To restore that, to save it from being turned into another estate agent, is brilliant.”

Henry Harris at Racine

The relaunched venue is expected to open later this year, and will maintain its current format of being a more drinks-focused pub on the ground floor and a restaurant upstairs.

“We’re doing some work inside, but lots of the elements that were there before — like the wonderfully ornate ceiling in the dining room — will be just as people remember them,” said Harris.

He also confirmed that the food will blend British and French influences. And that includes the famed roasts.

“The menu as a whole will have a distinctly British pub feel, but with continental hints as well, and particularly French influences," he said.

“People can expect a traditional British roast beef with all the trimmings and a nice punchy horseradish, but equally we might lay on a seven-hour slow-roasted shoulder of lamb with rosemary, which has a much more French feel.”

The best Sunday roasts in London

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The Sunday lunch at The Truscott Arms was named the best roast dinner in the UK at the British Roast Dinner Week awards in 2014. Harris says that once the pub is back up and running he plans to enter it into the awards once again.

If he does, he may end up taking on former Truscott Arms chef Aidan McGee, who has recently taken the helm at Fitzrovia’s The George & Dragon pub.

Small world indeed.

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