Fantômas was a fictional French serial killer who shrouded himself in different disguises to achieve his dastardly deeds.
On his favoured weapons list: giant snakes, plague-infested rats and rooms that fill with sand.
Thankfully, all Chelsea’s seductive new restaurant shares is the name.
It’s the latest opening from a veteran hospitality duo who are also behind Beast, Belvedere, and Chelsea’s Wild Tavern. They probably could have franchised a Little Chef, and people would still have come. But instead, they’ve bussed in one of the city’s most gifted chefs to head up the kitchen here.
Chris Denney burst onto the scene when he opened 108 Garage with Luca Longobardi back in 2017, just when he was about to jack it all in and become a potter. His equally successful solo project, Fiend, followed a few years later. And now here he is in Chelsea, applying his trademark ingenuity and panache to a menu that’s broadly Modern European, with the occasional nod from East Asia.
Firstly, the space: Fantômas is a looker. Housed in an old bank on a corner of the quieter stretch of the King’s Road, just as it meets World’s End, it’s dark and brooding from the outside save for the neon red signage over the door. Step inside, and your retinas will adjust, ever so slightly, to a sultry, dimly-lit space furnished with slaked lime walls; pristine tablecloths; and pendant lighting swathed in globes of raw linen. A steel open kitchen shimmers at the back of the main room, while a standalone bar at the front is a persuasive spot to start, or end the evening, with a Miso Old Fashioned or a Devil’s Sazerac.
The menu is a flexible beast that suits both sharing and individual ordering, and while you decide you could do worse than to sip on the dashi broth – a seemingly simple dish but beautiful in its execution, with the hum of bonito dwelling in its umber depths and a heady hit from the mustard oil which gives the soup an uncharacteristically buttery texture.
Where to go from here? Maybe the “Di Recco” flatbread, a handkerchief-thin disc stuffed with porcini and ricotta, or the delicate white beetroot & green apple salad folded over buttermilk ranch dressing. The crispy veal sweetbreads, bringing together bulgogi and sauerkraut, sounds a winner too.
For mains, there’s just-pink Josper-grilled squab pigeon, served with its leg crowning a ruffle of almost translucent radicchio; exquisitely tender John Dory and cockles in a puddle of brown butter; and the scene-stealing baked celeriac, blanketed in pecorino and breadcrumbs.
Leave room for the desserts, which include a ‘chocolate bar’ with Jerusalem artichoke ice cream; a cucumber & sake slushy; a heady rum savarin topped with chantilly and pineapple; and a crème caramel that reeks – deliciously – of campfires.
Paired with a bottle from the (actually pretty reasonable) wine list, it’s possible to keep a meal here at the merely ‘blowout’ rather than ‘completely eye-watering’ mark – although Fantômas is also the kind of place whose blackboard of drinks specials includes an ‘Iconic Glass of the Month’ at £71. For most locals, that’s probably nothing to even blink at. But for everyone else, if you have something special to celebrate…
…it’s worth disguising yourself as one, just for a night.
NOTE: Fantômas is open for dinner Tuesday to Saturday, with Saturday lunch from 23rd November. You can find out more, and make a booking at the Fantômas website.
Fantômas | 300 King’s Road, London, SW3 5UH
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