Michelin-starred Pidgin cuts opening hours to reduce pressure on staff

The 28-cover restaurant changes its entire four-course menu every week, alongside the wine and cocktail list, and has not repeated a single dish since it opened in July 2015.

But now Pidgin’s co-founders James Ramsden and Sam Herlihy say they want to give head chef Dan Graham and his team a break from the ‘demanding’ process.

From April the restaurant will close on Tuesdays and will instead open 6pm-11pm Wednesday and Thursday, and 1pm-11pm on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

The founders hope that giving chefs more time away from the pass will allow the restaurant to continue to ‘innovate and improve’.

“The team does an amazing job in tirelessly changing the entire menu every single week…and we are immensely proud of the creativity and rigour with which they approach this demanding process,” Ramsden and Herlihy said in a statement.

“Everyone knows working in a kitchen is both gruelling and rewarding, and we want Dan and his team to spend more time outside of the kitchen to travel, meet suppliers, collaborate with other chefs in the industry, and, frankly, get more time to think about something other than work!”

Ramsden and Herlihy opened Pidgin in 2015 following the success of their London supper club Secret Larder.

It received its first star in the Michelin Guide Great Britain and Ireland 2017​​ under head chef Elizabeth Allen, who left the restaurant and was replaced by Graham last September.

A number of other top restaurants have cut back their opening hours in the past few years. Sat Bains with Rooms switched to a four-day week in 2015,​​ while Le Gavroche has reduced the maximum working hours for staff​​ to 50 hours a week.