HIVE restaurant at Selfridges opens with emphasis on educating diners on the tasting notes of honey and importance of beekeeping
HIVE restaurant at Selfridges, a new honey-based bistronomique-concept restaurant complete with onsite beehives and keepers, has opened with a honey pairing menu taking diners on a journey of the flavours, aromas and tasting notes of this wonder ingredient.
Founded by honey expert and entrepreneur Khalid Samata, the menu incorporates a range of French dishes, all creatively incorporating the highest-quality natural honey. Diners will be able to experience an immersive honey-inspired environment, with the modernist interior paying homage to the key ingredient through botanical statement walls, decadent golden bee structures, and plant boxes with florals pollinated by the restaurant’s own bee population – which can be viewed dwelling just outside the window.
The restaurant welcomes guests to enjoy a lunch and dinner menu, which encompasses a range of innovative dishes made with quality organic ingredients. These include monk fish roasted with rosemary honey, creamy polenta with cheese and corn; cornfed roasted chicken with gratin of Savoyard potatoes, honey sauce & cherry vine tomatoes; and the show-stopping HIVE signature dessert, a beehive-shaped pastry with chestnut honey, pear, ginger and bee pollen.
Guests can also enjoy a selection of crafted honey-based cocktails, with signatures including the Mountain Tini, made using Belvedere vodka, mountain honey kombucha, Suze, Noilly Prat vermouth, celery bitter and an olive garnish; and the Nutty Naughty Bee, a cocktail of Beefeater gin, chestnut honey, lemon juice, Tonka bitter and black sesame powder.
Additionally, HIVE offers breakfast and a range of honey and cheese pairings to be enjoyed throughout the day, including Comté and chestnut honey, and Fourme d’Ambert with buckwheat honey. For a truly unique honey-based dining experience, HIVE also offers a cheese and honey afternoon tea experience, with diners able to choose from a range of delicious teas, Veuve Clicquot Champagne, pastries and cheeses to compliment the exquisite range of natural honeys.
Honey has earned a reputation as one of the purest and most natural ingredients for over 5,000 years, and is known to offer unique remedial qualities, including reducing anxiety, calming insomnia, and combating fatigue. The exceptional range of honeys utilised in HIVE’s menu is both harvested on-site from the restaurant’s own rooftop hives and procured by the artisanal farm Le Miel des Français, whose selection offers a range of rich natural flavours, chosen to perfectly compliment HIVE’s menu.
The 100,000 HIVE rooftop bees at Selfridges are looked after by experienced beekeeper and conservationist Mark Patterson, who uses his expertise and knowledge to educate guests about the critical importance of bees in the ecosystem. The restaurant can be found on the third floor of Selfridges and HIVE has partnered with L’Atelier Five – an award-winning design and production agency based in London Mayfair – which from concept to design and fabrication, has brought the HIVE restaurant vision to reality.
NOTES TO EDITORS
About Khalid Samata
Khalid Samata originates from the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, more specifically from Béarn where Jurançon wine is made. He studied International Business in Pau, while working as a waiter and shortly becoming a manager of the acclaimed seasonal restaurant, Mar y Sol, in Hossegor on the Atlantic Coast.
Following this, Khalid started a career as a salesman in a digital media company between Pau and Biarritz, before accepting a position at the French Embassy in London in 2009, where he was in charge of VIP relations.
In 2017, Khalid studied the various characteristics of honey and carried out market research which led to the birth of Le Miel des Français. This new brand of honey guarantees an optimum quality, 100% produced in France and 100% natural, which following the harvest, is directly analysed and bottled.
For a year, Khalid spent almost every weekend back home in the French Pyrénées discovering this buzzing ecosystem, meeting local experts and learning about bees, flowers, honey and its use and benefits to health and wellbeing. He soon partnered with Michelin-starred chefs to create the finest honey desserts that are now served across the best restaurants in London.
For further information and imagery, please contact:
Alessandro Ferrara
The Public Platform
hive@thepublicplatform.com