WORDS
Jane Fulcher
The background
Luca is an Italian-British restaurant from The Clove Club team: chefs Isaac McHale and Robert Chambers and co-owners Daniel Willis and Johnny Smith. In an expansive and beautiful space in Clerkenwell they have created a warm and inviting restaurant that uses the finest British ingredients to create an irresistible menu of Italian classics crafted through a more local lens. Like The Clove Club, Luca takes its ingredients and cooking very seriously, but the team isn’t trying to recreate the same boundary-pushing firebrand of a restaurant. Luca is a restaurant for all occasions – special evenings out, or a casual lunch, a true local restaurant as well as a destination.

The space
The full magnificence of Luca isn’t at all apparent when entering the cozy boothed bar. But the elements of sumptuous green leather, dark wood and marble counters hint at the restrained opulence of the following rooms. Entering into the heart of the restaurant, diners walk past the mouthwatering pasta-making counter, two beautiful private rooms into an enormous and airy space surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows. It is completed with orange and turquoise leather seats and banquettes, huge Deco lamps and chandeliers, and natural wooden tables as well as views out onto the courtyard garden. Unusually for a central London restaurant, Luca has a large and truly gorgeous outdoor space which in mild weather is open for dining and can also be booked for weddings.
The menu
Luca has the option of à la carte or a prix fixe menu for £75 which includes a chef’s selection of dishes, from antipasti to dolci, and is undoubtedly the best way to experience everything Luca has to offer. To start, one of the restaurant’s signatures is a plate of parmesan fries: these are not simply chips with parmesan shavings but rather a kind of churros filled with warm and fluffy parmesan soufflé or mousse on the inside and served crispy on the outside. This dish is utterly irresistible; it’s worth visiting the restaurant to try the parmesan fries alone.

To follow was a perfectly soft and creamy burrata with winter squash, pickled walnuts and roasted pumpkin seed oil and a plate of salty and moreish whipped salt cod served with red peppers, capers, black olive and rosemary. Next came a perfectly cooked crispy and tender scallop complete with nduja. The pasta course was a beautifully gooey cacio e pepe with black truffle: a sumptuous and surprisingly subtle dish. So often truffle is used to hide rather than lift mediocre cooking, but not here, where the dish came perfectly balanced – indulgent and delicious but not overwhelming.
A secondi of beautifully prepared halibut with mussels, leeks and haricot beans arrived tender, delicate and elevated with a hint of saffron. And for dessert, one of the most appealing lemon tarts the world has ever seen, glowing yellow and with the perfect curdy, custardy consistency served with a refreshing rosemary ice cream.

To drink, follow the sommelier’s suggestions for navigating the almost wholly Italian list, which has a truly impressive range of vintages. The list of Piedmont reds are particularly impressive. The cocktail list at Luca is also fantastic – try the savoury Luca martini made from Baller vodka, smoked vermouth, umami, Chinotto Nero, and Parmesan, or the wonderful and sophisticated Golden Negroni, made from Sacred dry gin, Strega, vermouth bianco, Grappa and olive oil.
The bill
The price fixe menu is £75 per person, wine starts at £35 and cocktails are around £14 each.
The verdict
Luca is a wonderfully warm, welcoming and special place to dine, whether for a special occasion or casual lunch. It’s a truly magical offering from The Clove Club team, that expresses just how much they love restaurants and understand why people treasure them.