The 40-cover restaurant is located below chef Stevie Parle's Dock Kitchen at 342-344 Ladbroke Grove. Kitchenette is inviting new food start-ups to apply for four to six weeks’ residencies in the space.
The restaurant is the latest concept developed by the incubator group, which was set up by Cynthia Shanmugalingam in January 2013. It has since helped a number of pop-ups with their launches, including Kimchinary and Mei Mei’s Street Kart.
Cynthia says: “We want the restaurant to give Londoners the opportunity to discover and back new restaurant ideas - food they'd love to see, coming soon to a neighbourhood near them.
“We hope customers will come back each month to try the next concept out and tell us exactly what they think. We think there’s a big appetite for food trends that haven’t yet really taken off in London, moving from street food to bricks-and-mortar.”
A helping hand
Kitchenette offers each new food start-up the support of a panel of advisors and chef mentors.
Currently industry backers and mentors include founder of Meat Liquor Yianni Papoutsis, founder of Hix restaurant group Mark Hix, founder of Dishoom Shamil Thakrar and founder of The Cinnamon Club Iqbal Wahhab.
Each start-up is also given a ready-made front-of-house team as well as systems and suppliers, which means that they are able to focus on the menu.
Customers who dine at Kitchenette are invited to give reviews and feedback, which allows the pop-ups to prove their concepts, raise money and move towards opening their own sites.
Pao Wow
The first pop-up which has launched in Kitchenette is Pao Wow, a modern Indian dining concept by Anshu Ahuja.
Ahuja said: “After a summer of street food, I felt excited about introducing London to a lighter, fresher take on Indian cooking, from my home city. There are no curries here, but fresh and distinctive small plates with flavours from Maharashtra, Kerala, Goa and Karnataka.
“If the feedback from our Kitchenette residency is good, the dream is to open a neighbourhood place next year with informal, fresh Indian food, brilliant suppliers, and a great wine list.”
Future pop-ups which will open in Kitchenette include New Orleans po’ boys and Japanese barbeque, and more pop-ups are invited to apply for the space online.