Hot goss from April Bloomfield’s kitchen at Sailor in Fort Greene—actually about 3,500 miles from there, in simmering London hotspots like the chef-driven Quo Vadis and Rochelle Canteen.
Sailor Kitchen Takeover Lineup
We hear that beginning this summer and stretching into fall, Sailor will partner with Chase Sapphire Reserve to bring British chefs like Jeremy Lee and Hector Henderson to Fort Greene for a kitchen-takeover series they’ve dubbed London Calling. Sailor unveiled the name of the series on Monday with a post announcing the first chef: Margot and Hector Henderson of Rochelle Canteen.
Edible Brooklyn has since learned that the series’ second segment will come in September, with Jeremy Lee of Quo Vadis at the helm. Chef Jackson Boxer of Dove will follow that in October, bringing with him the comfy British staples and neighborhood-style dining that’ve made his Notting Hill spot an immediate sensation. The final incarnation of London Calling will take place in November when Richard Corrigan of Bentley’s Oyster Bar and Grill takes the helm.
Sailor partner Gabriel Stulman had no comment.
London Calling on OpenTable
The word “takeover” here should be taken with a grain of salt, it appears that each chef will offer seatings via OpenTable over two nights—and those tables will only be available to Chase Sapphire Reserve cardholders (or, if there is a world where some seats go unbooked, they will simply be given priority). While they can book tables for the first installment now, there is no information as to when reservations might open for the next three.
It can be hard to get excited for a guest spot. That said, these are matches made in heaven. When the British-born Bloomfield brought her rustic, seasonal, ingredient-focused mastery to New York with the Spotted Pig, it changed things. People use that word, “change,” far too loosely, but the fact that Americans now look for Michelin Stars, that interminable wait for a resto that only takes walk-ins, the gastropub in the US—Bloomfield and The Spotted Pig had a big part in all of it. And these chefs come with similar dining DNA.
While plenty of details remain unconfirmed, and there’s no word if Lee’s smoked eel sandwich will make its way here, that’s almost beside the point. Sailor is importing philosophies, not specific dishes. The idea that New Yorkers can get a chance to experience Corrigan’s humble Irish approach to our seasonal veggies is almost too good to be true (last November, you could still get tomatoes at the Union Square Farmers’ Market, btw).
While we’re not saying that Jeremy Lee’s take on peaches and corn is worth the Sapphire Reserve card’s $795 annual fee, this kind of effort from Chase—owners of The Infatuation, it should be mentioned—is hard to go unnoticed. For dining dedicants, with moves like this, the once substantive American Express Platinum cards could start to look like an expensive hunk of metal.
