If the letters ‘BYOB’ conjure up images of student curry nights accompanied by six-packs of lager, then corkage is what happens when BYOB graduates and grows up. ‘It appeals to people who have their own wine collection and would like to drink their own bottles,’ says master sommelier and IWSC judge Isa Bal, co-owner of Trivet and Labombe restaurants. ‘Plus anyone celebrating with a bottle that means something special to them.’ All of which usually requires the sort of life experience (and finances) you don’t possess in freshers’ week.
Bal charges £35 for corkage at both two-Michelin-starred Trivet in Bermondsey and his one-Michelin-starred Mayfair restaurant Labombe, which opened last year. Despite prices for everything from ingredients to electricity rising across the board, Bal’s corkage charge has barely increased since Trivet opened in 2019. It is an unusually reasonable outlay at this level of London dining: fellow Michelin two stars Da Terra, A. Wong and The Clove Club charge £70, £80 and £85 respectively, while one-star Dorian in Notting Hill hit the headlines in 2024 when it increased the price of corkage to £100 with the condition that guests purchase at least one bottle of similar retail value from the wine list.
Dorian’s owner Chris D’ Sylva wrote on Instagram that ‘our business is not sustainable on food sales alone.’ Many restaurateurs operating on wafer-thin margins are likely to have sympathy with d’Sylva but the new policy wasn’t perhaps the best PR for Dorian. Low corkage fees, on the other hand, might not earn a restaurant much in the way of revenue but the customer loyalty is priceless.
Kitchen W8 in Kensington, for instance, offers free corkage at the traditionally quiet times of Sunday evening and throughout the month of August to encourage diners through the door. Adam Byatt likewise offered free Sunday evening corkage when he opened Trinity in Clapham in 2006. ‘We’re now fully booked every Sunday,’ the chef says, ‘so I could stop the free corkage. But it’s a nice thing to be able to offer the local community.’
Corkage is a nice thing to be able to offer the local community
– Adam Byatt
Byatt says that only around 10% of diners bring their own bottles; at Mayfair Chinese Hakkasan, head sommelier Alessia Mandolini says that most weeks only two or three tables bring their own wine. Those that do, however, have usually put just as much thought into their selection it as if they were choosing from the Hakkasan wine list. ‘The bottles are often older vintages, larger formats or wines thar mean something personal to the guest,’ Mandolini says.
Corkage is useful to restaurants in ways beyond creating good will. ‘It lets me taste some exceptional wines,’ says Mathieu Germond, owner of the French restaurant Noizé in Fitzrovia, who often offers a four-course menu specifically matched to guests’ own wines. ‘The sommelier must taste the wine for their own knowledge and to be able to serve it in the best condition.’
It is not uncommon, however, for a restaurant to limit the number of bottles a guest can bring; for those that don’t, ‘be mindful of how many bottles you arrive with,’ says Bal. ‘We don’t like it if a sommelier gets stuck with one table.’
Other courtesies, whether stated explicitly or not, include notifying the restaurant in advance that you intend to bring your own bottles and offering to pour the maîtr’d or sommelier their own glass. Ordering a cocktail to start or a digestif to finish is likely to be appreciated too. And although everyone I spoke to was too polite to say so, tipping more than the usual 12.5% to acknowledge the lost revenue is also good manners.
The most considerate thing of all is to bring interesting wine. ‘If you pop into Majestic for a buy-five-and-get-one-free offer,’ Byatt says, ‘and then you bring the free bottle to my restaurant, I’m not going to be that chuffed. I want my food to be eaten with beautiful, well thought-out wine. If a customer can’t afford to drink at that level from my wine list but they can if they bring the wine themselves, then I think that’s a win.’
That sense of consideration also means checking ahead to see what’s in the restaurant’s cellar. ‘Don’t bring wines that are already on the list,’ Byatt says. ‘That’s just rude.’
Notify the restaurant in advance that you intend to bring your own wine and offer to pour the sommelier a glass
But even if you follow the rules, there’s no guarantee that things will turn out well. ‘One guest brought a 30-year-old bottle that had turned to vinegar,’ says Hakkasan’s Mandolini. ‘Everyone just laughed. It became part of the evening’s fun.’
Ultimately, that is why restaurants allow gusts to bring their own wine. ‘Corkage, at its best, is about generosity and sharing,’ says Kitchen W8’s general manager Allegra Morelli. ‘When guests bring a bottle they love, it adds to the atmosphere of the restaurant. That is something we truly value.’ And something worth raising a glass to. Just make sure you offer the sommelier a taste first.
The best corkage deals at top London restaurants
Barrafina
Various locations
There are now five branches of the tapas bar inspired by Cal Pep in Barcelona but the no-bookings Soho outpost a block over from the original Frith Street site remains the best and, if you arrive before 6pm, you’re unlikely to have to queue for a place at the counter.
Corkage: £42 per standard bottle, £84 per magnum
Blacklock
Various locations
What Hawksmoor is to steak, Blacklock is to chops, though you can also find an excellent sirloin or ribeye here if pork loin chops don’t take your fancy. The house cheeseburger demonstrates the same commitment to thoughtful sourcing of British ingredients as the rest of the menu.
Corkage: £10
Bocca di Lupo
Soho
Chef Jacob Kenedy’s menu offers a grand tour of Italy’s regions, from a radicchio and taleggio lasagne from Lombardy in the north, all the way south to Puglian braised chickpeas with tomato, chilli and mint. Prime seating is at the counter by the open kitchen but the dining room at the back is better for larger groups.
Corkage: First two bottles or one magnum: £20 per standard bottle or £40 for a magnum. Thereafter, £50 per bottle and £75 for larger formats.
Brat
Shoreditch
Chef Tomos Parry’s debut restaurant combines east-London edge (a first-floor location in a former lapdancing club) with rustic wood-fired cooking that blends the ingredients of the chef’s Anglesey childhood with technique picked up on his travels around the Basque Country.
Corkage: £30 (notify the reservations team when booking)
Brunswick House
Vauxhall
The Vauxhall gyratory might not sound like a location with much meal appeal beyond Prêt and Nando’s but Brunswick House is full of surprises, from the Georgian building stuffed with antique furniture for sale to Jackson Boxer’s internationally influenced British cooking and cellar bar The Black Duke for post-dinner drinks.
Corkage: Free on Sunday and Tuesday; Wednesday to Saturday, £25 per person
Cinder
Belsize Park and St John’s Wood
The solo project of former Ritz chef Jake Finn, Cinder is a pair of smoke-and-small plates restaurants in Belsize Park and St John’s Wood. The kitchen is powered by a Josper oven, which provides the essential flavour for the likes of chicken thighs with confit lemon, chilli and garlic.
Corkage: £45
Chez Bruce
Wandsworth
Chez Bruce, which opened in 1995, two years after Marco Pierre White left what was previously Harveys on the same site, has become something of a legend on London’s restaurant scene. Its reputation is based on gimmick-free French/Mediterranean cooking that has been deemed worthy of one Michelin star for more than 25 years. Expect dishes such as duck with braised lentils, chou farci, garlic purée and foie gras; and lobster raviolo with bisque sauce, brown shrimps and chives. The cheeseboard is a rite of passage.
Corkage: Free on Sunday (notify the reservations team when booking); otherwise, £50 for dinner and £25 at lunch per standard bottle
Cornus
Belgravia
This rooftop fine-dining restaurant has impeccable credentials: owners Joe Mercer Nairne and David O’Connor have run Medlar in Chelsea since 2011. It’s a lovely light-filled location for accomplished Anglo-French cooking and very slick service.
Corkage: £20 per 75cl bottle at lunch, £40 at dinner
Dinings SW3
Knightsbridge
Handy for the Harrods fine-wine department, Dinings SW3 offers a more serene alternative to nearby Zuma when modern Japanese is the order of the day. Expertly sourced and sliced raw fish – whether nigiri, hand rolls or sashimi – is a highlight.
Corkage: Free on Sunday and Monday, £50 the rest of the week
Hakkasan
Mayfair
The restaurant that proved that Chinese food could be paired with wine allows guests to bring their own wine. Ask to sit upstairs for lunch, which has natural light; the nightclub vibes of the blue-lit basement are better in the evening. Order the Hakkasan classics in both: roasted silver cod with Champagne and honey, sweet and sour Dingley Dell pork, and smoked beef ribs with jasmine tea.
Corkage: £40 for a bottle of wine or saké, £80 for a magnum, £100 for spirits or Chinese wine not already listed on the restaurant’s wine list. One bottle per person up to a maximum of four bottles per table.
Hawksmoor
Various locations
Everyone’s favourite steak chain hit on its winning recipe of charcoal-grilled, sustainably reared, 35-day-aged steaks 20 years ago but it’s a formula that never gets tired, not least because of the thrill of new locations: the recent St Pancras outpost is a bobby dazzler. Bored of steak? The fish and seafood options are just as good.
Corkage: £5 on Mondays, £25 Tuesday to Sunday
Ikoyi
Strand
With menus starting at £150 for lunch and £350 for dinner, knowing that the wine won’t add too much to the bill makes a meal at Ikoyi even more relaxing. Jeremy Chan’s two-Michelin-starred cooking is worth every penny, as too an intimate experience in which there’s one member of staff for every 1.5 guests in the 22-cover dining room.
Corkage: £50 for lunch, £75 for dinner
Kitchen W8
Kensington
The smartest restaurant near Kensington High Street is co-owned by Phil Howard, whose much-missed Mayfair restaurant The Square appears on the CV of Kitchen W8’s head chef Mark Kempson. Game and white truffle are highlights of the intensely flavoured seasonal cooking, plus there’s a Sunday roast for traditionalists.
Corkage: Free on Sunday evenings, one bottle per person with a maximum of four bottles per table. £30 per bottle at other times, with the same terms.
Luca
Farringdon
Luca’s plain green frontage gives no clue as to the stylishness of the interiors within, from the booths and vintage fittings of the bar to the expansive dining room behind, illuminated by a wall of full-length windows. Pasta made in house (agnolotti of Alpine speck, girolles and borettane onions, for example) is the highlight of the Italian menu.
Corkage: £50 per bottle for a maximum of two bottles
Macellaio RC
Various locations
Don’t be deceived by the French bistro look of this trio of steak restaurants: macellaio is the Italian word for ‘butcher’ and the sides of cow on display are more than mere window dressing, with most parts of the animal appearing on the menu, from T-bone and rib-eye steaks to heart and liver.
Corkage: Free
Mountain
Soho
Tomos Parry’s follow-up to Brat likewise offers corkage to go with a similar menu of wood-fired cooking made in an open kitchen. North Wales meets northern Spain in the likes of whole lobster caldereta.
Corkage: £30 (notify the reservations team when booking)
The Ninth
Fitzrovia
This narrow townhouse with bare-brick walls inside and a summertime terrace out front is the ninth restaurant in which chef Jun Tanaka has worked and the first that he has owned. Despite the Michelin star, the cooking is approachably straightforward and the vegetarian dishes a highlight.
Corkage: Free on Mondays, for up to six people with one bottle each; Tuesday to Saturday, £40 per bottle (one per person)
Noble Rot
Various locations
There are now three French-focused Noble Rots in the West End but the Soho restaurant feels the most in tune with the ethos of its wine-importer owners, not least because the old Gay Hussar site – the stamping ground of Labour Party grandees for the second half of the 20th century – still feels like a shrine to the art of the bibulous long lunch.
Corkage: £35 for a standard bottle (notify the front of house team when booking)
Noizé
Fitzrovia
Mathieu Germond was for many years the manager of Pied à Terre, so when he opened his first solo restaurant round the corner in 2017, he had a ready-made, loyal clientele. Punters continue to return for classic Gallic dishes like terrine maison but just as much for host-with-the-most Germond.
Corkage: £30
Quality Chop House
Farringdon
There’s always at least one old-fashioned chop on the daily changing menu here but also lots of modern ideas like Yorkshire mallard with orange-braised chicory and Bordelaise sauce, a contemporary contrast with the Grade II-listed wooden Victorian booths. Co-owner Will Lander is the son of wine critic Jancis Robinson.
Corkage: £40
Quo Vadis
Soho
Jeremy Lee has made this famous dining room an essential part of London eating again since taking over the kitchen in 2012. The smoked eel sandwich anointed with the hottest of horseradish sauces is almost as legendary as the fact that this is where Karl Marx wrote Das Kapital in the 1860s.
Corkage: £42 per bottle, £84 per magnum
Singburi
Shoreditch
The Shoreditch reinvention of a Leytonstone restaurant regularly hailed as London’s best Thai has kept everything that made the original so compelling – hot and sour cooking, longstanding family ownership – but brought it up to date with twice the number of covers and cool industrial decor.
Corkage: £33
Trinity
Clapham
Adam Byatt’s Michelin-starred kitchen is a contender for serving not only the best food in Clapham but all of south London. Four-course menus are served in the more formal ground floor, small plates to share in the casual Upstairs, and there’s a charming terrace in summer with views of the trees swaying on the Common.
Corkage: Free on Sunday evening, otherwise £35 for still wine, £40 for sparkling. One bottle per two guests, not already listed on the restaurant’s wine list (notify the reservations team when booking)
Trivet
Bermondsey
Sommelier Isa Bal and chef Jonny Lake met while working at The Fat Duck before opening their own place. Creative cooking along the lines of grilled Cornish mullet with green apple, fennel and trout roe is magicked up in an open kitchen. The pair’s Mayfair restaurant Labombe offers the same corkage deal but with more casual dishes.
Corkage: £35
Trullo
Islington
Islington’s best restaurant remains as reasonably priced as when it opened off Highbury Corner in 2010. Pasta and puddings are the highlight – pici cacio e pepe followed by chocolate and salted caramel tart, say – or go with a group and share something like Hereford bone-in sirloin with crispy polenta and gorgonzola fonduta. Book in advance.
Corkage: £30 for a bottle and £50 for a magnum
Wildflowers
Belgravia
Wildflowers is the first solo project of chef Aaron Potter (ex -Trinity and Elystan Street) and his business partner Laura Hart, a florist and stylist who used to work for Petersham Nurseries. Expect rustically inspired southern European cooking with an emphasis on provenance and flavour.
Corkage: £30 at lunch, £40 at dinner. One 75cl bottle per guest, up to four per table
