Ox and Finch team to launch new Glasgow restaurant, Ka Pao

The team behind acclaimed Glasgow restaurant Ox and Finch is set to open a new venue, Kao Pao. 

The restaurant, due to launch in January, will be located in the city's listed Botanical Gardens, and will specialise in modern South East Asian cuisine, following a successful residency at Acid Bar at SWG3 last year as well as several pop-up events.

The menu, according to the group's announcement on Facebook, will likely include dishes such as "messy prawns, orange, tamarind and palm sugar caramel; squash and potato curry, cardamom, cumin and coconut; slow-cooked pork cheeks, shiitake mushrooms, star anise and galangal.

At the helm in the kitchen will be chefs Jonathan MacDonald and Ox and Finch head chef Daniel Spurr, with Andy MacSween managing the front of house across both restaurants. While many of the team have been recruited internally, they are currently looking for sous-chefs, chefs de partie and front of house professionals.

On the decision to take the menu down the South East Asian route, Jonathan MacDonald said: “I have had an enormous amount of respect for the approach to food in South East Asia for as long as I have been cooking. The fascination was really ignited when I spent a lot of time working and travelling in that part of the world in my twenties. Living and working in Melbourne was also a big inspiration, as South East Asian flavours and influences are uniquely interwoven in Australian cooking.

Some of my most memorable cooking and eating experiences have been in Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand: sometimes in impressive restaurants, but more often on plastic stools by the side of the road.” 

The team's message on Facebook, meanwhile, expressed their excitement at launching the new venue.

"We hope that you will enjoy Ka Pao as much as we have enjoyed welcoming you to dine at Ox and Finch during the past five-and-a-half years. We are very grateful for such amazing support. We look forward to welcoming you to Ka Pao in 2020 and, of course, throughout the year at Ox and Finch too."