Humble Chicken.

Humble Chicken

Angelo Sato opened this Frith Street room in 2021 as a casual yakitori bar, turned it into a tasting counter in 2023, and had two Michelin stars by February 2025.

Why go

Sato trained at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay before going out on his own, and the cooking reads as Japanese technique with a fine-dining kitchen's discipline behind it: seafood cured and dressed in citrus kosho, sole poached in shiitake dashi, a donabe rice pot finished with crispy chicken leg that keeps the restaurant's original name honest. The Michelin Guide UK and Ireland gave the restaurant one star in the 2024 edition and a second in the 2025 edition. Sato then shut the room in March 2025 for a £1 million rebuild in cherry joinery and marble, cutting covers from twenty to thirteen and lifting the menu to sixteen courses at £235. Broadsheet quotes his ambition without hedging: "The goal has always been to have a three-star restaurant, since I was 13."

Order this / avoid

• Order: the set menu, since that is all there is. The dishes Time Out singled out were the milk bread with miso sesame butter and chicken liver parfait, the bao with crispy pig trotter, and the donabe rice with crispy chicken leg.3
• Avoid: booking for anyone with a dietary requirement. The restaurant states it cannot cook around vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free or coeliac diets, or severe allergies.

What locals & experts say

• Chetan Sharma, chef-patron of BiBi (January 2025): It's the least fussy two-Michelin-starred restaurant in town. He credits Sato's Japanese upbringing and the kitchens behind him, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, Eleven Madison Park and Trinity, then spends as long on the hosts: Sato's brother JP runs the floor with general manager Aiden, and Aiden, in particular, has exceptional knowledge of wine and sake, which is unique. The plate he remembers is the bread course, served with pickles and an extraordinary butter layered with foie gras, truffle, and butter itself.1
• Time Out (Leonie Cooper, Mar 2023): five stars, calling it a magical menu that pivots from seafood mastery that's nigh on hallucinogenic, and finding that his powerful tasting menu doesn't have a duff dish on it.3
• Michelin Guide UK and Ireland: one star in the 2024 edition, two in the 2025 edition.5
• Broadsheet London (Jul 2025): Sato on the register he wants after the rebuild, fine dining for the next generation that is less stuffy.4
• Local rec: Fuchsia Dunlop on Twitter, per Jeff's note.

Good to know

• Timing: one sitting format, lunch and dinner at the same £235; the site does not publish service days, so check the booking calendar.
• Booking: essential and prepaid. Seats are non-refundable, with a single reschedule allowed on at least a week's notice.
• Getting there: 54 Frith Street, three minutes from Tottenham Court Road station.

Jeff's take (his words)

• Rec via: Fuchsia Dunlop on Twitter.
• Note: Fuchsia Dunlop on Twitter; UK top resto

Verdict

must-visit — Two Michelin stars inside four years, at a counter of thirteen seats, from a chef who started the room as a yakitori bar and rebuilt it twice. The cooking carries a documented critical verdict as well as the decorations, Time Out's 'doesn't have a duff dish on it', and the format is unrepeatable elsewhere: one kitchen, one menu, thirteen people watching it happen.