Cin Cin Fitzrovia is Now Open in London

The backstory to Cin Cin, which recently opened its third location in Fitzrovia, is an interesting one. Sydney-born founder David Toscano spent two decades as a lawyer before making the move to the hospitality industry. “I really wanted to have a second career that I really cared about and could see myself doing for a long time,” Toscano tells La Cucina Italiana.

While Toscano is not a trained chef, he is no stranger to Italian cuisine, with both sides of his family hailing from Calabria in southern Italy. “The lightbulb moment for me was realizing that it wasn’t normal for people to be growing up learning how to make pasta from scratch with their grandmother or making wine with their grandfather.”

It all began in 2013 with Toscano’s spontaneous purchase of a vintage 1972 Fiat 850 van, out of which he catered events. He explains that the aim was never to remain a street-food service, but rather “a way to inch myself into the industry and to find my feet.” Head chef Jamie Halsall came onto the scene in 2014, and the duo opened up their first restaurant in Brighton in 2016, followed by a larger site in Hove in 2018.

The genesis of the Fitzrovia outpost was a swift one, resulting from a serendipitous conversation in February 2021 with a friend involved with the site. The restaurant opened on the corner of Foley Street in mid-May, with a south-facing terrace and nautical vestiges of the former Bonnie Gull Seafood Shack. There have been no structural changes — a smart cost-effective move amid the pandemic — but there are plans for updates in the new year. The London site has departed from the open kitchen, counter-style seating that is characteristic of the southeast sister restaurants. Instead, there’s a small kitchen downstairs, giving the four chefs some privacy and space to let off steam.

Cin Cin doesn’t mimic traditional Italian cuisine but rather offers a novel approach, with Toscano citing restaurants Polpo and Trullo as inspiration. “We’re working with fresh British seasonal produce and building a modern Italian dish around it," Toscano says. "We’re not trying to wholesale recreate something from a particular region in Italy.”

Since setting up their first handmade pasta-driven site, Toscano and Halsall have noticed the proliferation of similar projects. “There’s this explosion of handmade pasta. It’s definitely been a real change in the accessibility of modern Italian food in London, which is great.” The London kitchen’s warm and dry conditions, however, are less conducive to the craft of handmade pasta so there’s more of a focus on secondi-style dishes.

That said, the fresh pasta is still a real highlight. A ravioli doppio dish in June, for instance, features a pea mixture in one half and carrot in the other, both of which are sealed side by side and topped with girolles and shavings of summer truffle. Meanwhile, snack options include Italian delicacies such as Nocellara olives and rosemary focaccia, and small plates including burrata with peperonata, rocket, and black olive double as starters.

“One of the simplest examples of where our cuisine splinters away from traditional Italian cuisine is that we focus a lot on sauces and butters. Our dishes are a lot richer than Mediterranean-style [ones].” There are typically four mains, which include protein-based dishes such as sea bream with white beans, radicchio, hazelnut, and olive agrodolce, while desserts include chocolate, amaretti, and caramel pudding or Zabaglione with Moscato-poached apricots and honey. Menus change on a four-to-six-week basis, there are daily specials, and a reasonably priced lunch set menu.

While Halsall works with British ingredients, the wine list is all Italian, with Toscano resisting the temptation to feature Australian labels. “I didn’t want to add it for the sake of it. Italy has so many indigenous grapes and great suppliers at a very affordable price point. There’s no need to dilute the approach with other countries of origin.” His Australian heritage isn’t entirely absent, with The Australiano spritz featured on the aperitivi list.

There are no new sites on the horizon, but Toscano has always envisaged five outposts. “This happened very quickly, and it was hard. But once we’d done it, I think I could do another four now,” he laughs. Further sites, however, will require expansion of the management team, which is currently made up of just Halsall and Toscano, both of whom are still based in Brighton. “It’s worked well so far, but for us to go from three to four sites, we need to bulk out the team,” he adds. Here’s hoping they get a well-deserved trip to Italy in the meantime.