Some addresses come with a ghost. 43 Upper Brook Street was Le Gavroche for 57 years, the Roux family's temple of butter and white linen, until January 2024. On 4 November 2025 it reopened as Bonheur by Matt Abé, and in February 2026 it was awarded two Michelin stars. Even the loo route has a framed Michelin Man, which is either confidence or a joke.
The Royal Hospital Road line
Abé was born in Sydney and spent 18 years at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay on Royal Hospital Road. He worked in Clare Smyth's team, ran the kitchen after she departed to launch Core, and later became chef patron, running a three-star kitchen from the age of 28. Bonheur is his first restaurant of his own. Ramsay finances it and is partner and adviser, but the name above the door is Abé's. There is a neat symmetry: Royal Hospital Road was once Pierre Koffmann's La Tante Claire, so Ramsay now holds both of the great classical French houses of the 1990s, and Abé has simply walked from one to the other.
Le Gavroche's old address, a Sydney-born chef and two Michelin stars inside three months.
The room
Russell Sage Studio, the firm behind Ramsay's Petrus, traded Le Gavroche's stiff linen for warmth. Upstairs is a plush lounge of soft seating and low light that feels residential; downstairs the dining room runs in muted pink and orange, with round booths under textured artworks and a few nods to Abé's Australian roots. It is comfortable enough to be somebody's very good flat. Then there is the music, which ranges from Jamiroquai and Earth, Wind and Fire to Robbie Williams, The Smiths and Toto's Africa. It suits an occasion that would rather not feel like one.
What to order
Guests choose between a short à la carte or one of two tasting menus, the five-course Journey and the seven-course Dream, and the menus are built not to overlap, so dishes swap across smoothly for dietary needs. Everything below has been served, and menus change.
Start with the quiche Lorraine, the dish that explains the project: a crisp pastry case of smoked ham, leek and Gruyère, with black garlic and a Vin Jaune sauce in the Journey version. It is a pub classic with a two-star education. The Japanese milk bread and butter are excellent, and a second round is hard to resist. An Isle of Skye scallop, seared on the barbecue and finished with yuzu kosho beurre blanc, shows the house habit of restraint: spice you find rather than spice that finds you. Cornish turbot is poached and lifted by a bright lovage sauce.
For the main event, Cumbrian Blue Grey sirloin aged 125 days, from Lake District Farmers, arrives with a potato terrine, smoked bone marrow and a bordelaise. Other tables have met Herdwick hogget with courgette and olive tapenade, or fallow deer with beetroot and blackberry. Pudding is the pecan praline with cocoa nib ice cream, or a toasted grains dessert that tastes like the best breakfast cereal.
One honest note: Country and Town House found the tasting-menu sitting brisk, with food arriving from the moment guests sat down, while à la carte tables seemed to get more breathing room. Michelin's inspectors, for their part, singled out the sauces.
Drinks
Sommelier Eric Zwiebel, who arrived from The Samling in the Lake District, runs a list that roams the world, unlike its almost entirely French predecessor. Pairings are explained with restraint, and rarities include a dessert Ratafia drawn from Champagne barrels with a giant pipette.
Le Gavroche taught London to dress for dinner. Bonheur keeps the dress code and loses the starch.
- The vibe
- Plush lounge upstairs, muted pink-and-orange dining room below, unexpectedly funky playlist.
- The food
- Classical bones, lighter touch: quiche Lorraine, barbecued scallop, aged sirloin, milk bread.
- The drink
- A world-roaming wine list; try the Ratafia drawn with a giant pipette.
- A tip
- Petit Bonheur is the chef's table; lunch runs Thursday to Saturday.
