World Restaurant Awards: Noble Rot wins ‘Red-Wine Serving Restaurant’ small plate

During a night of glitz and Champagne, the winners of the inaugural World Restaurants Awards were announced tonight in Paris.

While London was all but overlooked, Holborn’s Noble Rot came out on top in the Red-Wine Serving Restaurant category. The smirking ‘small plate’ award – one of six light-hearted, less prestigious accolades handed out – praised the central spot as “driving force in making wine bars cool again.” Given how many restaurants go in for red wine, the Lamb's Conduit Street spot should be uncorking bottles of its best.

In truth, the night was never going to belong to London. The honours were split into 12 ‘big plates’ – the more prestigious honours – and the six ‘small plates’. Across all categories, London chefs and restaurants only had a paltry six nominations in total. Of the big wins, South Africa’s Wolfgat was named Restaurant of the Year, which also was named the judges’ favourite Off-Map Destination, while Japan’s Inua was picked as the panel’s favourite new arrival.

Elsewhere, Alain Ducasse was named the Tattoo-Free Chef of the year, while the Tweezer Free Kitchen small plate went to Thailand’s Bo.Lan.

The evening marked the first year of the grandly named awards, which were held in the Palais Brongniart, the former Parisian stock exchange. Founded by IMG – best known in food circles as the group behind the Taste Festivals – the awards were in partnership with critic Andrea Petrini, a man once dubbed ‘The God of Food’ by Italian Vogue, and creative director Joe Warwick, the highly regarded food writer who was among the team that created the World's 50 Best Restaurant Awards.

The judging panel for the awards was kept to 50 men and 50 women, among them chefs, restaurateurs and the best known names in food journalism. They included chefs Massimo Bottura, Hélène Darroze, Daniel Humm, Yotam Ottolenghi and Clare Smyth, as well as food writers Tom Parker Bowles and Richard Vines.

For more information, visit restaurantawards.world.