london

The Holborn Dining Room

• Modern British• Holborn

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About the restaurant

While Holborn Dining Room puts British dishes at the forefront, inside it could be a New York brasserie, with opulent marble tables, spacious booths and an enormous bar that winds itself around one corner and serves an incredible selection of gins. The hotel also includes Scarfes Bar, a cocktail bar inspired by political cartoonist Gerald Scarfe's works.

Head chef Calum Franklin worked in kitchens including Chapter One in Kent and Roast in Borough Market before moving to Holborn Dining Room. There, he's earned a reputation as someone committed to reviving heritage British dishes, with a particular focus on spectacular pies, documented on an Instagram account with a following nearing 100,000 and in a recently released cookbook.

Roasted meats and fish dishes are always popular, but it's Franklin's pastry creations that take centre stage here: pies are baked to perfection with crunchy, crumbly pastry and delicious fillings like curried lamb and potato and comté, while the beef wellington is the stuff of legend. The adjacent Pie Room acts as a dedicated prep kitchen for the day's pies, and also sells them to take away from a street-facing counter.

Reviews from the Web

Critic reviews

The Infatuation

The pie room has an outside window that means you don’t even have to enter the faux-glamorous room, but although the grab-and-go is convenient and less expensive, you need to sit in if you want your pies made to order.

The Guardian

If you come here and don’t order a pie, you’ll only have yourself to blame.

Standard

The Rosewood’s brasserie, Holborn Dining Room, is my personal idea of a heaven; not that I’ll ever be beckoned upwards — but if hell is full, I’d happily spend eternity eating chef Calum Franklin’s pies.

The Telegraph

The latest grand, all-day brasserie to open near the Rosewood Hotel is a vibrant and engaging restaurant, more 'New Yorky' than its rivals

Time Out

Chef Calum Franklin’s much-hyped ‘pie room’ is in the corner of Holborn Dining Room – an opulent venue that’s so old fashioned it kind of feels like you’ve stepped back in time.

The Nudge

Calum Franklin puts together all manner of short-crusted treats to be enjoyed in the main dining room