Obituary: Andreas Antoniou - ‘Vrisaki’ - 1943-2026
This week, our Cypriot and Greek community in London lost one of its heroes. Andreas Antoniou, owner of the fabled Vrisaki, passed away on Monday 12th October 2026 at 83. To many of us, Andreas was a constant, synonymous with his taverna-embassy that came to epitomise the UK’s Cypriot community. Having originally opened as a kebab takeaway on Myddleton Road on 11th October 1981, Vrisaki became the London-Cypriot community’s flagship taverna, and is now once again a small kebab takeaway based in Potters Bar.
I had the pleasure of getting to know Andreas a bit more in the past few years, speaking to him when filming content, gathering information for this page and website, and sometimes when picking up pittes in between. In a short period of time, he said many things that stuck with me and really underlined how pivotal his character was to Vrisaki’s success. One of them was «τα πολλά λόγια είναι φτώχεια» (‘a lot of words are worthless’).
He was someone who would always say a lot with few words and talk through action, but I got to see the no-nonsense modesty open up into patient, softly-spoken wisdom, a beaming smile that recounted countless stories of the good old days in Myddleton Road, but, most importantly, a nowadays-rare, old-fashioned measure of unconditional kindness and honour. Andreas’ kindness was always amplified by the flurry of loving comments and messages that would follow every post about Vrisaki, without fail. Across a handful of posts in which I covered Vrisaki and its news, hundreds of people commented and privately messaged, sharing stories about times in which Andreas helped them or their family, or a heartwarming exchange.
Andreas always had time for people in a way that reflected his customer-first philosophy, and we can surely say that he is someone who genuinely cared for the people who sat at his table. I saw that whenever my grandfather would catch up with him after months or years, as though they had only just seen each other the previous day. 30 to 40-odd years after being a regular at the original taverna on Myddleton Road, my grandparents once again became Vrisaki regulars when it relocated to their neighbourhood in Potters Bar.
Andreas took a central role in London’s Cypriot community, just as he did with his home village, Koma tou Yialou, serving on its association board in London. As President of the National Federation of Cypriots in the UK, Christos Karaolis, recalls: “Andreas embodied the very best of our Cypriot diaspora. I will always remember the warmth, generosity and hospitality he showed whenever I brought friends or visitors from Cyprus to Vrisaki. He never forgot his roots in Koma tou Yialou, and Vrisaki became a true home for the Association he chaired with such devotion for many years. He will be deeply missed by us all.”
UK Cypriot community newspaper Parikiaki’s Michael Yiakoumi has known Andreas since the start of his career. “Andreas was a fantastic bloke, always happy. I knew him from the beginning, he used to work for my dad in the city when he was training to be a chef at Marina Restaurant. When he opened Vrisaki, I remember it – it was only a small takeaway shop. It was a treasure. In those days there weren’t many Cypriot restaurants, very few. He was one of the first to introduce meze as well as kebabs. He was a good chef, always in the kitchen, making sure the food was good. He used to pop his head out every now and then and speak to the customers, but he was mainly in the kitchen. It was never about the money. He did a lot for the community, and supported a lot of organisations. He would never say no.”
It’s no coincidence that Vrisaki was the go-to venue for many family and social gatherings, whatever the occasion: regulars all share stories of birthdays, christenings, engagements, weddings, funerals, memorials and everything in between. Regular Veronica Giesen shares that she would visit Vrisaki with her late husband: “Sotiris and I used to go to Vrisaki a lot and we had his last birthday party there, as well as his memorials. Andreas was always a friendly and kind man, with a big character. He will be missed.”
Beyond his own community, a diverse cross-section of North London’s demographics formed a notable proportion of Vrisaki’s regulars, and it has to be noted that Andreas is certainly the single Cypriot in the UK most responsible for so many Brits, Asians, and everyone else in between learning to eat sheftalies, souvlakia and Cypriot food in general.
Jonathan Nunn is a London-based food and city writer, and founder of respected food publication Vittles. His first published piece of London food writing was about none other than Vrisaki. “I was very sad to hear about the passing of Andreas, a man who has contributed so much to the life of Cypriot North London. I grew up with Vrisaki as my local takeaway, and didn't realise at the time how lucky I was to experience the restaurant at its height, with Andreas and his family behind the till and an energy that you couldn't find anywhere else in the city. The restaurant and sense of community he created was an inspiration - when I started writing about London's food in 2018, it was Vrisaki that was the subject of my first ever piece of writing. Andreas is one of the few people you can say changed the way that Londoners eat, and for the better - he will be much missed.”
Vrisaki has fed, raised and united ethnicities as well as generations. Andreas’ son Tony once told me how customers would call in from as far as America and China before visiting to secure their spot. It’s now incredibly heartwarming seeing the response on this account from people across the global Greek diaspora who, as far as they may be, are able to recognise and appreciate the extent of Andreas’ contribution to the Cypriot and Greek diaspora as a whole. When you think about it, because of the pace of information exchange that the 21st Century has facilitated, paired with London’s reach, Vrisaki is probably the most famous Cypriot taverna to have ever existed. It was the first Cypriot taverna to introduce Cypriot cuisine to such a wide audience, and equally played a pivotal role in relaying Cypriot identity and traditions to second- and third-generation Cypriots, setting the standard high for North London’s taverna and souvlitzidiko scene in the process.
Vrisaki’s awards and accolades equally reflect the standard that Andreas set. In 2003 Evening Standard readers voted it London’s Restaurant of the Year. As serial regular-turned-partner, Andy Litras put it, “there will never be another Vrisaki. There were times when I was in the kitchen wrapping pittes, and Andreas was cooking. The skewers he would hand over to me were a work of art. He would never put something out that he wasn’t happy with, and there was a time he had a go at me because he wasn’t happy about the way that someone had cut the lettuce.” Those who knew him echo Andreas’ mantra as he once said it to me himself: “Never serve a customer something that you wouldn’t be happy with yourself.”
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from searching, researching, and working really quite hard just to try to pin down good food, it’s that all good food and true hospitality have one common denominator: a person who genuinely cares about their product and their diners, often at the expense of some of their own personal or financial interests. They don’t care about scale or expansion or reputation, they care about the food and the people. Behind the gravity of the name ‘Vrisaki’ and its reputation, we are ultimately talking about a person with their own personal life, their circle of loved ones, who dedicated 45 years of service for us to hold on to our culture and share it with the people around us. All of that takes sacrifice, and Andreas, like many others, dedicated his life to his vocation. Or, as he once aptly said to me:
«η ζωή μου όλη»,
“my whole life”.
My thoughts are with his family and loved ones.
Αιωνία του η μνήμη.