Wilding is a sustainably focused wine bar, shop and restaurant in the Jericho area of Oxford.
The project is the brainchild of founder Kent Barker whose 30-year career has seen him hold senior positions at big name hospitality players like Bibendum, Oddbins and Enotria. Joining forces with Chef Dominique Goltinger and Head of Wine, Sarah Helliwell, Barker has created a venue that is detail focused with a keen attention paid to limiting the restaurant's environmental impact.
Chef Goltinger – who most recently worked at Maremma in Brixton – has created a flexing menu that rolls with the season to champion provenance and British produce. In fact, part of the menu’s strength is that it has been created in collaboration with a local Somerset forager to ensure biodiversity of ingredients and unique flavour profiles which change regularly. The menu centres around sharing style dishes and on any given day might feature dishes like hand-dive scallops with seashore vegetables and wild capers or chargrilled asparagus with Caerphilly cheese and hogweed shoot dressing.
Other sections on the menu span market fish, charcuterie and seafood boards, while meat includes ex-dairy cow beef. Additionally, all butchering and fermentation is done on site to minimise food waste.
To complement the food, the drinks have been carefully chosen by Helliwell, and the list includes 50 wines available by the glass as well as ten vintages on tap for a fun and modern way to enjoy top quality wines without a hefty price tag.
The welcoming restaurant space can seat 80 covers in the main area, while guests can also make use of the 16-seater private dining space if they prefer, or plump for one of the twenty seats at the bar. A large garden surrounded by wildflowers and aromatic herbs as well as vines from local vineyards extends the restaurant’s capacity in warmer weather, allowing for a further 60 guests.
There is also a retail space on site where you can buy from a selection of over 400 wines, and in the small shop there is room for up to ten guests to enjoy drinks and snacks.