The story
The Ninth is a modern French restaurant at 22 Charlotte Street in Fitzrovia, London, with Mediterranean influences and seasonal produce across the menu. It holds a Michelin star (2026) and three AA Rosettes for culinary excellence.
Chef-patron Jun Tanaka opened the restaurant in 2015 after more than 30 years in London kitchens, including Le Gavroche and The Square. Executive chef Filippo Alessandri trained in Italy before returning to the restaurant as head chef in 2022. The approach is simple on paper: top quality seasonal ingredients, cooked with a light hand and classic flavour pairings.
The pain perdu with tonka bean ice cream is the dish the restaurant is best known for. The Good Food Guide describes snacks such as crab and seaweed tartlets and coccoli dough balls with artichoke purée and black truffle. Mains often lean Italian and Provençal, with whole grilled sea bass served alongside mussels and Sicilian datterini tomatoes.
The main dining room has grey banquettes, roughcast brickwork and mirrors, with a few seats at the bar and another room upstairs. A covered, heated terrace suits alfresco meals on Charlotte Street. The first floor can be hired for larger groups, and a semi-private area seats up to 20.
Recognition
Ambience
Details
History
High quality cooking
Jun Tanaka's ninth restaurant enterprise settled into the foodscape of Charlotte Street as soon as it opened, and is now off and running again, following a period of closure due to a fire. The ambience still feels cool and relaxed, with grey banquettes against roughcast brickwork, ornamental lights and mirrors, plus a few comfortable seats at the bar and another room upstairs. Clued-up staff are full of personable maturity without being overbearing, while the pace is judged to perfection. Initial flavours are as strong and multi-layered as they need to be to make a good first impression – as in snacks such as exquisite crab and seaweed tartlets, or coccoli dough balls with puréed artichokes and a great whack of black truffle. Starters from the sharing menu might feature a tempura-battered piece of red mullet with carrot/shallot escabeche and shrieking-green wild garlic aïoli (that perfect batter one of a few personal references from a chef with Japanese heritage). Otherwise, an Italian and Provençal mood prevails: mains take a simpler approach for a veal chop with morels, or whole grilled (but not especially crisp-skinned) sea bass, surrounded by an honour-guard of luscious mussels and Sicilian datterini tomatoes in red and amber shades. Finish with chopped peach poached in mulled wine with yoghurt sorbet and mint oil or a gargantuan choux au craquelin, its biscuit-coated, chocolate-based soft shell encasing a huge orb of pistachio ice cream. This is a menu yearning away from the concept of sharing dishes (how to divide a serving of monkfish, prawns and clams in broth?) but the food is bright and appealing at nearly every turn, right down to the good-value set lunch. A mostly impressive wine list needs a little more variety among dry whites by the glass, where high-acid Sauvignons, Rieslings and Verdejos rule the roost, but there are good growers throughout.
3 Rosette Award for Culinary Excellence
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