Lee Tiernan returns to his old Black Axe Mangal site
The chef and his wife Kate reopen 156 Canonbury Road for a two-day pop-up this month, ten months after closing the cult kebab restaurant for good.
Lee Tiernan is back at 156 Canonbury Road. The chef behind Black Axe Mangal returns to his old Islington site for a two-day pop-up on 23 and 24 October, ten months after closing the restaurant for good.
The event is called the Kerrygold x Lee Tiernan Sandwich Shop. Tiernan and his wife Kate are serving three sandwiches built around a new Kerrygold cream cheese launch, free of charge: 300 a day, 100 of each, one per person, no reservations. The pop-up lands in Islington, a short walk from where Yield opened its third wine bar on Essex Road last month.
Three sandwiches, no bookings
Fun, interesting and not something you'll see all too often
The vegetarian option pairs mushroom mapo, scallion cream cheese, coriander and pickles on a Papos plain bagel. A second sandwich layers char siu-cured Irish bacon with garlic and herb cream cheese, lettuce and roasted tomato on Dusty Knuckle sourdough. The third sets smoked cod roe and wild Irish seaweed cream cheese against lemon zest and trout caviar on a squid ink loaf baked to the old Black Axe Mangal recipe.
"Fun, interesting and not something you'll see all too often," Tiernan said of the vegetarian sandwich. "I can't wait to get behind the counter and share these sandwiches with everyone," he added of the weekend itself.
Doors open Friday 23 October from midday to 4pm and Saturday 24 October from 10am to 2pm. Kerrygold senior brand manager Lucy Hay said the brand picked Tiernan because "we knew he wouldn't play it safe."
Ten years at one address
Black Axe Mangal began as a six-week kebab pop-up in a Copenhagen nightclub courtyard in 2014, before Tiernan opened a permanent restaurant on Canonbury Road the following year. It closed during the pandemic lockdowns and reopened as FKABAM, short for Formerly Known As Black Axe Mangal, before Tiernan and Kate ended the ten-year run with a final service on 20 December 2025.
Neither Kerrygold nor Tiernan has named what comes next at the site. The pop-up is billed as a prelude to a new, permanent concept, still unannounced, in a London restaurant scene where head chefs are moving fast this autumn. For a chef whose cooking helped define a decade of London's loudest, grill-driven openings, the sandwich counter is the only preview on offer for now.
