Leroy alumni to relaunch restaurant as Duchy

The former executive chef at the now-closed Leroy in London’s Shoreditch is launching a new restaurant in its place with fellow operations manager Alex Grant.

Chef Simon Shand held the Michelin star at the east London wine bar and bistro for three consecutive years until his departure from Leroy in February last year.

In November, owners Ed Thaw and Jack Lewens confirmed the restaurant’s closure, just weeks after the Autumn Budget.  

The former site of Leroy will reopen as the 40-cover Duchy restaurant next month under new owners Shand and Grant, who first met while working at Leroy in 2021. They had always wanted to open a restaurant of their own after a trip together to San Sebastián.

Duchy will combine Shand’s classical French training at the likes of Arbutus, Wild Honey, and Frenchie with his passion for Italian game, pasta, and antipasti. Taking its name from the historical Duchy of Savoy, which spanned Lyon, Milan, Geneva and Nice for 800 years, the restaurant will offer the best of French and Italian cuisine.

Dishes will include snacks such as pork shoulder and smoked eel croquettes; brown crab arancini; and anchovies with lardo on marjoram toast, as well as larger sharing plates like côté de boeuf with grilled baby gem and gorgonzola butter; whole grilled red mullet with baby potatoes and beurre blanc sauce; and cannoli with sweetened ricotta cheese.

Duchy will also serve a selection of classic and natural wines, as well as two regional negronis: the Negroni Savoyard (gin, vermouth and bitters from Chambery) and the Negroni Savoiardo (gin, Antica Formula and Campari from Piedmont).

Sasha Filskow of Inside Design is leading a renovation which will retain Leroy’s open kitchen and wall of 200 records.

Shand said: “We’re so excited to be able to get the doors open this spring. We’re so in love with the food and wine of this region and can’t wait to share it with everyone who visits.”

Grant added: “Leroy was that rarest of things and yet, even knowing it as well as I do, I often struggle to put into words why. It was serious. And small. It was wildly busy. It was loud at times, but wonderfully so. It was fast and loose and for a bistro of that size it had an extraordinary cellar… I guess, for me, the timing and the team were some kind of perfect storm. And I hope, with chance on our side, we can do the ghosts justice.”