A NEW restaurant will be going back in time - drawing on the heritage of the building it is set in and the best tradition of British food.
The Old Bank City Pub and Chop House on Fisher Street, Carlisle, opens on Wednesday with a menu packed with British classics.
The building was home to the Carlisle and Cumberland Bank in 1839 and still retains some of its original features, including an old vault and safe door downstairs.
Its new logo features a pig in a top hat representing a banker.
British classic eating has been a fashionable trend in London for a number of years, bucking the taste for continental and Mediterranean cuisine.
Matt Rayson, 26, is the man behind the new venture, which will draw on this culinary style.
He said: “It’s going to be casual dining as opposed to special occasion dining.
“We will be open for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
"I’ve put Eggs Benedict on the menu as it was first eaten by a broker at the Waldorf Hotel in New York.”
Mr Rayson’s lunchtime menu includes sandwiches and slow braised meats, including briskets and belly pork.
“Dinner is more traditional things like steaks, fish pie and ham, egg and chips but done in a 21st century way," he added.
“For desserts I will be serving things like treacle tart and Bakewell tart.”
Craft ales and wines from around the world will be available.
Mr Rayson bought the business, which was formerly No.34, last year from James Hill, who runs the Quarter Lounge. He also owns the deli further along the street.
Mr Hill said: “I’d had that business for nine years and I felt the time was right to sell it. Matt was looking for somewhere to set up on his own.”
Mr Rayson is busy painting and installing new wooden floors in the premises.
He said: “The toilets are very quirky. The women's toilets are done out in vintage Vogue magazines and the men's in superhero comics.”
Chop houses are a British tradition dating back hundreds of years.
Originally, they were men-only establishments.
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