Rosewood London’s new Sunday slow-food market

The urban farmers’ market gets a chic upgrade

The urban farmers’ market is getting a chic upgrade away from the typical car-park venue (Marylebone, j’accuse). The new Sunday Slow Food & Living Market – slow being an acronym for sustainable, local, organic and wholesome – will bring over 30 artisanal vendors to the grand inner courtyard at Holborn’s Rosewood London hotel at 10.30am from Sunday March 1, come rain or shine, and will be the only slow market in the capital to be endorsed by Slow Food UK.

Hansen & Lydersen will sell its farmed salmon (smoked in Stoke Newington), while Nyborg’s Kitchen bakery keeps up the Nordic theme with its Danish-influenced produce. For meat lovers, Gastronomica will offer charcuterie from more than 20 Italian suppliers, while O’Shea’s Butchers, an eighth-generation family business, will sell pasture-raised meat and game. Wildes Cheese makes soft, hard and washed-rind delights in a London microdairy, and organic fruit and vegetables come courtesy of three suppliers: Wild Country Organics, Chegworth Valley and The Bio-Scheme. Tea, coffee, chocolate, argan oil, beer, wine, flowers and even slow-food books will also be represented on the stalls – plus seasonal herbs from the Rosewood’s own rooftop garden.

For inspiration as to what to create once the fresh produce is back home, brunch will be served in two Rosewood London restaurants (12-5pm), with menus created by its new executive chef Amandine Chaignot. “It’s impossible not to be excited by all the fresh and fabulous ingredients on offer, and I am planning interesting ways to incorporate them into our culinary offerings,” she says.

In the Holborn Dining Room, menu specials on the inaugural market day will include Hansen & Lydersen’s smoked salmon, pancake and poached Burford Brown egg; Park Farm’s Bath Blue, thyme and walnut tart with a chicory and pear salad; O’Shea’s organic pork ribeye and black pudding with Chegworth Valley apple and duck-fat roast potatoes; and warm argan oil polenta cake with Hook & Son’s unpasteurised yoghurt sorbet.

The Mirror Room, meanwhile, will host four-course brunches (served 11.30am-3.30pm, £40, or £50 including a glass of Nyetimber English sparkling wine) featuring sharing charcuterie and cheese plates, egg of the day or slow roast of the week.

What a spring awakening for the taste buds.