To celebrate The Fat Duck’s 30th birthday, the team at the three-star Michelin restaurant will take diners on unique journeys of discovery by introducing new innovations and reviving some of its most famous creations.
On 16 August 2025, Heston Blumenthal’s The Fat Duck will be 30 years old. Ahead of the celebrations, the chefs have been busy pushing the Fat Duck classics to new levels of perfection and preparing to bring back some of Heston’s most exciting inventions, which led to the restaurant receiving three Michelin stars and being voted No. 1 in the World’s 50 Best Restaurants.
The Fat Duck team wants to create the biggest and best birthday present possible for Heston, the restaurant, and everyone who visits, and they have some amazing surprises in store that will undoubtedly astound the palate and mind.
The two new routes for culinary exploration are The Journey and The Trip. Each will take you somewhere surprising and stimulate the tastebuds and the imagination.
The Journey is the ultimate exploration of Heston’s unique culinary universe: the best of the best of this three-star chef. The Trip is a more compact gastronomic adventure – a shorter version of The Journey: the essential tasting rather than the complete.
Alongside some of the dishes that made the Fat Duck famous, such as Nitro-poached Aperitif, ‘Sound of the Sea’ and ‘Like a Kid in a Sweetshop’, the chefs have revisited and revitalised several dishes whose return has long been awaited.
These include the intensely flavoured Jelly of Quail, the Crab Ice Cream that led to Heston’s first scientific paper, and the mesmerising, dreamlike Counting Sheep.
Heston said, “When we took The Fat Duck to Australia, we served a menu called The Journey, which was inspired by memories of my childhood holidays. I knew then there was more I could do with this idea, so I’ve asked the chefs to revisit the menu and make it part of celebrations for The Fat Duck reaching an incredible 30th birthday milestone.”
Reservations for the Fat Duck 30th Birthday Anniversary menus can be made here: The Fat Duck 30th Anniversary Year Menus, Bray, Berkshire.
Photographs of ‘Sound of the Sea’ and ‘Aerated Beetroot’ by Jose Luis Lopez de Zubriria.