The chef, who won the BBC cooking show in 2012, had already secured a city centre site and had a target of £60,000 on Kickstarter to furnish the restaurant and put in a downstairs private dining room.
Piotrowski’s campaign saw £23,030 pledged by 217 backers, but as target was not reached the chef received none of the funding.
He told BigHospitality that the setback will not affect the plans for the restaurant at all, and the opening will go ahead as planned following some financial support from the banks.
“I went through it all and found that Kickstarter actually takes 10% at the end, so realistically it’s not as good as a 0% interest bank loan anyway,” he says.
“I think we gave the banks a little bit of bad press, but they've been really helpful after all.”
Piotrowski says that despite the change in approach for funding, the restaurant’s first service will be this Saturday. He acquired the keys to the site today (16 October) and will be doing a dinner for some customers from the restaurant that previously occupied the site.
Over the Christmas period the restaurant will be repainted and given new furniture.
“We’re not going for the super high end look anyway, it’s about the food” says Piotrowski
“Getting the equipment for the kitchen downstairs is the important thing. Rome wasn’t built in a day so bear with us if there’s a bit of rubble on the floor.”
Röski will offer two weekly-changing tasting menus with dishes likely to include pheasant braised in black bean sauce with a bao bun, chilli jam, and a fried quail egg; and baked sea bream, smoked butter mushroom puree and a parma ham crumble.
The chef previously told BigHospitality that he is planning to take reservations using a pre-pay ticketing system to tackle the issue of ‘no-shows’. Diners will pay for their meal beforehand before covering the costs of drinks on the night.
Piotrowski previously won a Michelin star at The Treby Arms in Sparkwell and helped launch Brown & Bean in Plymouth earlier this year before parting company with the owners to pursue his own restaurant.
The chef says he hopes Roski will “beat Manchester” to getting a Michelin star again.