Jason Atherton opens restaurant in Shanghai

21 May 2010
Jason Atherton opens restaurant in Shanghai

Michelin-starred-chef Jason Atherton has opened his first independent restaurant venture, at the Waterhouse at South Bund hotel in Shanghai.

Table No 1 by Jason Atherton, which opened as a 60-seat restaurant earlier this month in the Singaporean-owned boutique hotel, serves modern European dishes in tapas-sized portions. Starters are about £5.50, while main courses cost between £11 and £16 each and are designed to be shared.

Atherton, who left Gordon Ramsay Holdings at the end of last month, has signed a 10-year deal at the Waterhouse.

He said that while all the food is sourced locally, the style is not Asian in influence. Dishes include razor clams with garlic and chorizo and cauliflower with ras el hanout spicing. "The dishes have quite a natural presentation," Atherton told Caterersearch. "It's not molecular."

Menu items such as spaghetti with pork ragu will be divided up and served at the table in the same way that Chinese waiters would serve a bowl of noodles to several diners. Atherton believes the sharing concept will sit well with Chinese diners. "This is how Chinese food is eaten, many dishes are shared."

"Shanghai is not saturated with Michelin-starred chefs," said Atherton. "It's not like Dubai where you are just another fish in the pond. So I knew that if I was to get involved in a hotel it had to be something cool - I don't want to open a restaurant just for the sake of making money."

He added that Table No 1, which is headed up by former Maze and Maze Grill chef Scott Melvin, had been influenced by his time spent in Spain. In 1998, Atherton became the first British chef to complete a stage at Ferran Adria's three-Michelin-starred El Bulli restaurant. "My time in Spain was a turning point in my career. I love the country and it's important to me to pay homage to it."

Atherton is expected to open a restaurant, rumoured to be called Pollen Street Social Jason Atherton, in Mayfair this autumn. He will be demonstrating at Identita London at Vinopolis on 7 June.

Jason Atherton to leave Gordon Ramsay holdings >>

Video highlights from Madrid Fusion 2010 >>

Identita London 2010 >>

E-mail your comments to Amanda Afiya here.

If you have something to say on this story or anything else join the debate at Table Talk - Caterer's new networking forum. Go to www.caterersearch.com/tabletalk

Caterersearch.com jobs
Looking for a new job? Find your next restaurant job here with Caterersearch.com jobs

Blogs on Caterersearch.com](http://www.caterersearch.com/blogs) Catch up with more news and gossip on all Caterer's blogs
[Newsletters For the latest hospitality news, sign up for our e-mail newsletters.
The Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email

Start the working day with The Caterer’s free breakfast briefing email

Sign Up and manage your preferences below

Check mark icon
Thank you

You have successfully signed up for the Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email and will hear from us soon!

Jacobs Media is honoured to be the recipient of the 2020 Queen's Award for Enterprise.

The highest official awards for UK businesses since being established by royal warrant in 1965. Read more.

close

Ad Blocker detected

We have noticed you are using an adblocker and – although we support freedom of choice – we would like to ask you to enable ads on our site. They are an important revenue source which supports free access of our website's content, especially during the COVID-19 crisis.

trade tracker pixel tracking