Unsure how to spend your Halloween? After Nyne picks the best food and drink events across the city this weekend. Whether you’re a die-hard Halloween fan or just want to try and forget that it’s almost November, we’ve got it covered.
Drake & Morgan
As a full moon blazes in the black sky, Drake & Morgan hosts evenings of killer music, ghoulish gourmet treats & terrifyingly-tempting sharing tipples. On Freaky Friday 30th October, the group will be celebrating the season of spook with lavish parties across its portfolio of central London bars and restaurants. Leading the path to darkness will be the newly-opened flagshipDrake & Morgan at King’s Cross hosting a Dia de Los Muertos party in association with Don Julio Tequila. Held downstairs in the drop-dead gorgeous bar from 8pm, guests are encouraged to arrive in their best costumes for a night of mental mixology and spooky tunes from a DJ spinning until the wee hours of the Day of the Dead.
www.drakeandmorgan.co.uk
Bread Street Kitchen
Bravely tap three times on the bar of Bread Street Kitchen to try a terrifying tipple, The Smashing Pumpkin (£10), available for a limited time. With a base of Monkey Shoulder, this frightfully seasonal sip combines homemade pumpkin syrup with fresh lemon and mint, served in a mini pumpkin shrouded in dry ice. To carry on the spooky festivities, award-winning magician Michael J Fitch will be casting spells, confusing with slight of hand and bewitching diners throughout the day on Sunday 1st November. www.breadstreetkitchen.co.uk
The National Theatre Understudy
This Halloween, the National Theatre’s relaxed riverside pub The Understudy will be celebrating the spookiest time of the year with nightmarish festivities inspired by ‘The Scottish Play’, Macbeth.
Over the Halloween weekend, the bar will be adorned with ‘medieval Scottish props’ from the National Theatre’s own prop hire store, setting the scene for a weekend of eerie celebration. Visitors can expect a haunted experience, from the harrowing playlist echoing around the bar to service by mad Scotsmen and Wyrd Sisters.
Exclusively on All Hallow’s Eve itself, beer lovers can get into the spirit of things with the star of the show, ‘The Scottish Play’, a heather honey Scottish ale created especially for the occasion. Brewed by local Bermondsey-based Anspach & Hobday and made with honey from the beehives on the NT’s roof, the special brew will offer an authentic taste of the South Bank at Halloween.
True to tradition, guests are encouraged to showcase their finest Halloween attire. Liquid prizes will be on offer on Saturday for the freakiest male and female costumes.
www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/understudy
The Botanist Sloane Square
Forget spiced lattes, sometimes you need something a little stronger to see you through this frightfully chilly spell. Sink this season’s must-try tipple, Chai of the Living Dead (£9.50) at The Botanist Sloane Square, West London’s destination cocktail bar serving creatively kooky cocktails. Catering to every coven, this concoction combines Bulleit rye, frangelico, homemade pumpkin spice syrup, apple juice and chai foam, you’ll fall deeper under its spell with each sip.
www.sloanesquare.thebotanistlondon.com
Gelupo
The highly lauded artisan gelateria and delicatessen in Soho, will sate our autumn appetites with melt-in-the-mouth seasonal flavours available for this Halloween and Bonfire Night.
Created by critically acclaimed chef Jacob Kenedy, co-proprietor of Bocca di Lupo, Gelupo and Vico alongside Victor Hugo, the exclusive flavours handmade in Soho- Pumpkin & Cinnamon – will be available to sink your spoon into throughout Halloween.
Melt Room
Melt Room, the New York style grilled cheese sandwich shop in Soho, will be giving their classic hot sandwiches a seasonal twist this year, and are offering a delicious roast pumpkin melt, made with wookey hole cheese, pine nuts and sage.
So in homage to Melt Room’s motherland and the home of Halloween, make sure you don’t miss a trick, and treat yourself this year to this frightfully indulgent all- American delight.
Crab Tavern
This Halloween, Crab Tavern, the all-day dining seafood restaurant and bar in Broadgate Circle, will be offering their unlimited boozy brunch, with a slightly spookier twist.
Not up for trick or treating this year? Spend Halloween at Crab Tavern’s ‘re-vamped’ brunch where guests will be able to try three new Halloween cocktails including the Crackling Cauldron: chocolate liqueur, rose liqueur, vodka, sugar syrup and cream, served in a raspberry puree rimmed martini glass resembling gory blood drops; Glass Eyeball: gin, limoncello, grenadine and crushed ice, garnished with lychee and blueberry to create an eerie eyeball effect; and the Vampire’s Kiss: Triple Sec, pineapple juice, sugar syrup, Eristoff black garnished with a popping candy rim.
Guests will be able to Instagram themselves with a variety of haunting props, while bone-chilling movie tracks will be playing throughout.
The Halloween unlimited boozy brunch will be available one day only on the 31st of October from 1-3pm, for £45 per person.
Peyote
In honour of the Mexican tradition, Peyote will hold their ‘week of the dead’ celebrations starting on Monday 26th October. The fiesta will end with a late night party on Saturday 31st October, into the early hours of Sunday 1st November. The Day of the Dead honors friends and family members who have passed away with private, festive altars, the use of sugar sculls, and the deceased’s favourite foods and drinks.
Peyote will be transformed for the week, with a modern take on the Mexican Day of the Dead celebrations, and will have some seriously spooky menu additions and cocktails. This week long celebration is not one to be missed!
Morito
From the 20th to 31st October, Morito will be offering a black themed seafood tasting menu and a specially created spooky cocktail to wash down the most wicked tapas. Dishes featuring the darkest squid ink, spiky sea urchins and Morito’s signature black ink rolls will be accompanied by chilled sherries and cool cocktails.
Expert pumpkin carving will be in evidence with a sherry prize for the scariest pumpkin brought into the restaurant by a customer on Halloween night!
http://www.morito.co.uk/index.php
Lina Stores
An authentic Italian delicatessen in Soho, are doing a Halloween Pasta Special this week.From today until the end of Halloween weekend, Lina Stores will be serving a Homemade Black (Squid Ink) Pasta with a Puttanesca filling.
Olivia Reed
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