Strada, the Sun Capital-backed Italian restaurant group, has appointed Matt Fanthorpe, formerly of Jamie’s Italian, as its new chef director.
Fanthorpe joins the Hugh Osmond-led chain after three years as chef director at Jamie’s Italian.
He follow’s John Metcalf, the former head of procurement at Jamie Oliver Group and group operations director at PizzaExpress, in joining Strada. Metcalf took up the role of commercial director at the group earlier this year.
Last month, Osmond told M&C Report that changes to the brand’s food is the first phase of several changes the group will undergo as part of his longer-term plans to turn Strada around to be a market leader.
The menu changes include newly sourced ingredients like fresh ravioli and risottos, a new wine list and Jude’s ice cream, the family run artisanal ice cream makers from Hampshire. Strada’s meat and fish will now be entirely fresh, and their higher welfare, grain fed beef comes from specially sourced from Northamptonshire.
The new lunch & pre-theatre set menu is a part of the Strada offering following a spring trial held in 11 sites earlier this year. The set menu will be updated every few weeks by head chef Nico Tortorelli and will include new dishes as well as those on the a la carte menu.
New dishes on the a la carte menu include orecchiette pugliese, rigatoni carbonara, lemon ricotta cheesecake and poached salmon salad.
