From upmarket grocery shops to Soho House’s recruitment drive, here is the latest hospitality news from the CODE Bulletin

Catch up on the latest industry news stories of the week from the CODE Bulletin

Rarebit

There is a trend for upmarket grocery shops that double up as wine bars. The latest of this ilk to open will be Rarebit on Sayer Street in Elephant & Castle. Read about it here.

Stockwell Continental

The Italian-inspired cafe and restaurant Stockwell Continental (SC) closed yesterday after five years of roaring trade. Find out about the closure here.

Zia Luca

Zia Lucia is carrying on with its London-wide expansion, but will head closer to home with its next site next month. A pizzeria in Stoke Newington will open on 15 April.

Soho House

Soho House is embarking on a large-scale recruitment drive and plans to hire for more than 250 vacancies across its UK sites over the coming months. The members’ club is also improving its staff benefits and will pay team members who work from 10pm until close 1.5x the hourly rate. Soho House said the move is “part of a wider strategy to attract and retain the best talent”, and added that “site-based salaries are highly competitive within the hospitality industry and range from targeted earnings of £12 per hour up to £15 per hour”, not including tips. Contracts have also been updated to guarantee hours and holiday, and pay is now run in weekly cycles. Three days of paid leave for volunteer work have also been introduced, while the long-running “family meal” remains. Tom Collins, UK MD at Soho House, said: “Reopening after Covid has been a challenge but our teams have risen to the challenge. They continue to make us who we are and give our members best-in-class service and experiences. We’re committed to making sure they feel valued, supported and compensated.”

Rebecca Mascarenhas

The restaurateur Rebecca Mascarenhas and chef Phil Howard helped raise £135,000 for DEC’s Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal last month. The pair hosted a series of “Eat Out To Help Out Ukraine” dinners across their five London restaurants: Elystan Street; Kitchen W8; Church Road; Home SW15; and Flour + Water, where Brat’s Tomos Parry and team hosted a pop-up event. Staff worked for free, suppliers were “unfalteringly generous in their support”, and customers “turned up in droves”, Mascarenhas and Howard said. Coutts bank matched the funds raised pound-for-pound. “We couldn’t have dreamed that we’d be able to contribute this amount of money,” Mascarenhas said. “Phil and I are overwhelmed by people’s generosity and would like to thank everyone involved who worked so hard to make these fundraising dinners so effective.”

Budgie Montoya

Chef Budgie Montoya has called time on his Filipino restaurant Sarap Baon in Brixton. Montoya opened the site in January 2020 after a series of residencies, but said the impact of the pandemic, rising costs and energy prices had made the location impossible. He said: “I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity at Brixton Village – it was a great starting platform and they have been very supportive throughout the process. They obviously wanted to keep us there, but ultimately the aftermath of Covid-19 caught up with us and, given the current climate of increased costs and staffing shortages, it wasn’t responsible or possible to keep it going.” In November, Montoya opened a Sarap as a temporary residency in 10 Heddon Street in Mayfair, which is still going. It is chalked to finish in June but we – and probably everyone else who has been in – hope it continues well beyond the summer.

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