Farewell Marmiton. Welcome Alba.

The closure of Wanstead’s admired French restaurant Le Marmiton last week has been followed in swift order by the site’s conversion into a new Italian restaurant to be called Alba Trattoria.

The new restaurant, to be opened by South Woodford local Peter Hughes and his brothers Richard and Chris and their friend Andrea, will be the latest venue opened by the team who also have restaurants in Soho, Hackney and Hove.

Peter said: “At Alba we’ll make all our pasta in house every day, our pizza will be proved for over 48 hours and we’ll celebrate the best of traditional Italian cooking, alongside spritzes, negronis and small-batch regional Italian wines.

“We live locally and we are so excited to be opening our own place in the heart of Wanstead. We first opened our doors on Brewer Street in 2012. The culmination of a dream and the start of a journey.

“We are three brothers and a friend on a journey to create fantastic neighbourhood venues reminiscent of the fabulous family-run places of northern Italy, where we all grew up – magical Sunday night trips with our oldest brother Patrick and our mum and dad, to our local Trattoria just outside Milan, where we were born.

“The smoke from the wood-fired pizza oven as you walked through the front door of The Maneggio. The warmth of the greeting from the staff and the usual patter about the latest footballing scandal from the Tuscan owners as they seamlessly announced the day’s specials. Our family, all around the table tucking into amazing homemade pasta. These really are priceless memories for us.”

Peter met Andrea, the fourth member of the team, while working as chefs in the Mayfair restaurant Wild Honey. They opened Mele e Pere in Brewer St in 2012.

“Having cut our teeth in one of the most competitive restaurant markets in the world we decided it was time to grow. Gotto Trattoria on Canalside Hackney Wick came along in 2016. The Lock Inn, a Canalside Pub in Hackney Wick in 2020. Pesca Trattoria, which is a collaboration with our former Mele e Pere General Manager – Ed and his partner Steph, in Hove in 2021. And our latest, Alba Trattoria in Wanstead coming in 2023.”

The restaurant is expected to open later this month.

As is our tradition in these parts, thank you to the staff of Le Marmiton for your service, and best of luck to the Alba team for your new venture.

9 thoughts on “Farewell Marmiton. Welcome Alba.”

  1. There’s been no mention on this site of the closure of Bombetta, presumably because it was at the Snaresbrook end of the High Street and thus beneath Wansteadium’s notice.

  2. I never liked Marmiton.
    I always thought it was over rated and over priced!
    Though I accept it’s all a matter of personal taste and opinion.
    I agree that although I look forward to Albs opening a A Thai/Vietnamese/Chinese restaurant would have made a welcome change.
    As There is already an abundance of very good Italian type restaurants in the area

  3. Absolutely gutted Le Marmiton has closed – by far the most welcoming and relaxed eatery in the area – not pretentious like some and good honest menu – we will sadly miss it. Hopefully the new style will not be too chintzy – too much of that up the high street already.

  4. It’s not ideal having 3 Italians within sight of each other but judging by how busy Piccolo is it’s clearly what people want to eat. Yes a Thai or Chinese would be great but we had both of those and they closed down and I doubt it was because they were too busy. Maybe they weren’t good enough but I enjoyed both and was sad to see them both go.

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