New Restaurants in London this January, from Bar Valette to The Dark Horse

From dry January to veganuary and healthy-living resolutions still being stuck to, the first month of the year is not known for indulgence. Unless, of course, you’re Scottish or Chinese, in which case there’s Burns Night and the Year of the Snake to look forward to.

But one needn’t don a sporran or pick up a pair of chopsticks to have fun in January. For anyone who doesn’t see the next 31 days as some sort of penance for Christmas — foodwise or financially — salute those brave souls launching new businesses in a month when the idea of heading back to work fills many of us with dread. Here are some cracking new restaurants to inspire hope in what the year ahead holds.

Camden hasn’t had a decent boozer since Amy Winehouse hung up her ballet pumps at the Hawley Arms so hopes are high for this pub from the teams behind Le Bab and music venue Tape London. Bab founders Ed Brunet and Stephen Tozer and are putting fish and chips, bangers and mash, prawn cocktail and pies on the menu, while the pub will also be open for both full English breakfasts and Sunday roasts, based on dry-aged Hereford sirloin and Hampshire pork belly (pictured top). Music duties fall to Tape, which will be curating live nights and guest performances along with original music art on the bare brick walls of the old Victorian stable building.

A reincarnation of the Orasay site by chef-patron Jackson Boxer, who has said that running a high-end restaurant focussed on the best British fish and seafood has become financially untenable, even in Notting Hill. Instead, expect duck and pork meatball with Madeira sauce and fried pizzette with burrata and ham, though fish hasn’t gone entirely: there’s steamed hake with grilled cabbage, capers and lemon, too. The food focus may have changed but the interior has not, sticking to the same neutral palette that keeps the focus on Boxer’s deeply satisfying cooking. Sit in the window for the best people-watching inside and out.