It is 10am and in Notting Hill, Thomas Straker is sitting outside his eponymous restaurant, and not looking particularly fresh. There was a launch party last night — one he hosted. Straker has been celebrating his new range of butters, now for sale on Ocado and the Modern Milkman (with one per cent of annual turnover supporting agricultural charities; his Herefordshire-based family “have a small holding ourselves, so I understand the hardship of farming”). There are four — salted, unsalted, garlic and herb, chilli — and each under the brand All Things Butter. The move is a canny one: part of the Shrewsbury-educated chef’s enormous social following (2.1 million on Instagram, 2.3 million on TikTok) was built on a video series of the same name.
“It was mega viral, billions of views, millions of likes,” he says, proudly. “TikTok even did a case study on it, and I was like: that’s all very well and good, but how am I getting paid?” This is how, it turns out. Mind you, I say, you’ve built a restaurant on butter. “I definitely didn’t build the restaurant on butter,” he replies, shooting a look. True, there are the famous flatbreads.
