James Cochran revives 2018 menus

James Cochran, founder of Islington restaurant 12:51, has reintroduced his lockdown concept Around the Cluck to the menu, as well as his 2018 winning Great British Menu dishes and roast dinners.

Fried chicken concept Around the Cluck will feature every Monday until the end of the year on both dine-in and delivery menus, with dishes including crispy wings with roast gravy mayyonaise and buttermilk fried chicken burgers with blue cheese mousse.

Launching from 24 November, and running until 19 December, from Tuesday to Saturday, Cochran's menu will revisit his time on the TV show Great British Menu in 2018 via a five-course tasting menu.

Dishes will include his winning mushroom starter ‘Cep-tional’; and slow-braised shoulder of kid goat, barbecue pickled pineapple, scotch bonnet jam, black eyed pea dahl and jerk-spiced wet cornmeal.  

Finishing the week will be a roast dinner, charged at £25, including 51-day aged sirloin of belted Galloway beef, truffle cauliflower cheese, roast heritage carrots, burnt hispi cabbage, beef dripping roast potatoes, Yorkshire pudding, smoked bone marrow gravy and horseradish cream.

"When we ran with Around the Cluck back in April, we saw the need for comfort and was overwhelmed with how many of you loved what we did," Cochran comments. "That need for comfort hasn’t gone away, so we’ve listened to you and brought Around the Cluck back for you all to enjoy on arguably the worst day of the week.

"I think we can all agree that 2020 is hardly worth commemorating, so rewinding to some of our happier times, I hope you can come back and dine with us for a taste of a vintage year for us, 2018, where we really started flying and doing what we love most; serving our guests and seeing them enjoy what we do, in hope we can do the same next year.”