Pitt Cue Co would make for a great X Factor contestant, as the barbecue restaurant has been on quite the ‘journey’ in the last few years. Originally starting life as a street food stall, Pitt Cue opened a permanent bricks-and-mortar site on Soho’s Newburgh Street in 2012. Three years later, founders Jamie Berger and Tom Adams sold the concept and the new owners decide to relocate the restaurant from its Soho shoebox to an airy dining room on Devonshire Square.
However, the relocation was not a success, with the restaurant seemingly closing its doors for good in early 2019, with the endless building work taking place around the area said to have led to a decrease in footfall. Now though, Pitt Cue has made a return after Berger bought back the intellectual property rights to the brand. Berger plans to move the restaurant back to its Soho roots, but a site for the revived Pitt Cue has not yet been officially announced.
Fans of the restaurant will remember its three key principles of barbecue, bourbon and beer. Pitt Cue served a short and concise menu, which took provenance seriously – all beef was sourced from a single Cornish supplier, while bread was baked in-house. Highlights from the menu at the time included crisp ‘scrumpet’, which saw a pork-filled disc fried in breadcrumbs and served with a slick of apple sauce, while we were also impressed by mushroom and bone marrow mash. Pitt Cue was also well known for friendly service and reasonable prices, while the drinks list featured the likes of Mezcal, Martinis and Bourbons.
Before the announcement of the new permanent location, Berger will host a series of pop ups across the capital, which he’s calling ‘Flesh Mobs’. These one-off events will see Pitt Cue handing out hordes of free, meat-filled buns at locations across the capital.