Catch them if you can

Young Turks

Isaac Mchale (left) and James Lowe

The annual invasion of London by chefs and restaurateurs attending the (in my opinion philosophically and arithmetically specious) World’s 50 Best Restaurants awards is now over. And after all that fuss, I’m going make a prediction: in 10 years the world’s top chefs will be even more exciting than those working today.

This comment is not meant to cast aspersions on the likes of Ferran Adrià, Thomas Keller, Grant Achatz or Michel Troisgros. But I do believe that the current batch of young chefs has not only had the benefit of extraordinary teachers, but is also imbued with a passion for the food itself. This will, I hope, help them to overcome the problems that they face in the immediate future – in particular, how to finance their own restaurants.

Two British chefs, James Lowe, 31, and Isaac Mchale, 30, have solved this problem by opening a temporary restaurant. And so I recently found myself lost in Hackney, east London, looking for it. As I duly learnt, the restaurant had only one sign – a torn piece of cardboard resting on an iron column with the words “Y. Turks”.

After struggling to get into the building, I eventually reached the space known as The Loft Project, brainchild of Viajante chef Nuno Mendes and his partner Clarise Faria. Many chefs have used it over the past two years to show off their skills.

The layout of the room immediately conveyed both a professional and amateur air. Two scrubbed wooden tables with mismatched chairs were neatly laid for the 24 who had booked a six-course meal with matching wines. Mchale, development chef at The Ledbury, Notting Hill, and a self-professed “music nut”, has borrowed the name Young Turks from his friend’s record label, which also meant free T-shirts for the chefs and waiting staff.

We started with three canapés – gem lettuce, curds and anchovy, home-cured ham and cheese and smoked cod’s roe – while the chefs dealt with a crisis: six missing customers. Lowe and Mchale charge £60 a head for their meals, service and coffee (inclusive of five wines and a glass of stout with chocolate malt ice cream), but there is no margin for no-shows. As a result, this service started 45 minutes late and ended in a loss.

Matters eventually got under way with baskets of bread from St. John Bread & Wine, where Lowe was head chef before a stint at Noma in Copenhagen. A first course of a poached pheasant egg with wild garlic and snails was seasonal, earthy and full of flavour. It set a high standard, promptly surpassed by what followed.

Slices of beetroot with iced goat’s milk and elderberries (pickled by Lowe last summer) revealed the direction he has in mind – steering British ingredients towards the new Nordic cooking. A simple combination of warm Jersey royal potatoes, monk’s beard (a stringy Italian herbaceous plant) and white crab meat was stunningly good, as were two roast chickens, with the breast meat sliced thickly and served on a base of the dark meat, hop shoots and green onions.

Over five dinners and one lunch Lowe and Mchale served 130 customers, aided by two waiters and a washer-up. Rather than doing alternate courses, they collaborate on a full menu, usually via Google docs at 2am when Mchale gets home from The Ledbury. So far they have created 30 new dishes, although none too profitably as yet.

Most kitchens aim for a food cost that is at most 30 per cent of sales but Lowe confessed that theirs was closer to 50 per cent, if not a little more. “But this way of starting is great for ideas, for setting the groundwork and for allowing us to see the customers leaving happy. We want to learn, experiment, make friends, improve and get our names out there. The end game is our own restaurant,” Lowe said.

Plans for the next stage include renting out Lowe’s flat in south London to finance a more central site for a supper club, and a repeat performance of the Young Turks in New York, just after the James Beard food and drink awards in May.

In the process Lowe and Mchale hope that while they’re cooking, being talked about on Twitter and playing to full houses, they will catch the eye of a sponsor.

“We’re not fussy,” Mchale joked. “It could be Dr. Martens, Paul Smith or Barbour, or something more food related like Hildon Water or Maldon Salt.” Any restaurant with the name Young British Turks would certainly be beguiling – though I would suggest it should be clearly signalled. Outside.

nicholas.lander@ft.com

More columns at www.ft.com/lander

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Details

http://youngturks.co/

The Loft Project takes evening bookings for its supper club featuring chefs from around the world on Thursday, Friday and Saturday each week; www.theloftproject.co.uk