Brixton

Telephone: 020 3826 4090

Opening Hours:

Tues-Thu 5:00pm-10:30pm

Fri & Sat 12pm-10:30pm

Sun & Mon – closed

Kricket has come a long way from the premises in Pop Brixton and we have reviewed it a couple of times (see here and here). We often find it hard to get a table, so we advise booking or going very early. We have complained in the past about the sound level in the main dining room. So we were delighted to be able to sit at a table in the bar, which is less crowded and you can have a reasonable conversation with your companion without getting a sore throat.

Food is not the usual small plates and big plates malarkey but vegetarian, fish, meat and sundries. So we didn’t order fish – seemed simpler to say that and although we were determined on dessert, we never got that far.

Our first was a favourite when they were in Pop Brixton – a Bel Puri – raw mango, tamarind, sev and yogurt. Sev is the crunchy chick pea noodles that are flavoured with turmeric and other spices. It is the sort of thing you get in “bombay mix”. As it is a favourite we were not let down. The size of the portion though was a surprise and from this point onward we knew we had ordered too much for two people.

Next was another favourite and a staple of this restaurant – Samphire Pakoras – fried with samphire with chilli garlic mayo, date and tamarind chutney. This was mostly a success as the samphire can be a bit prickly and we did find a few sticks among the salty greenery. Again a huge portion – plenty for four as a starter.

We always order Tarka Daal – on this menu it is described as – Burnt Garlic Tarka Dal. Sometimes it is too bland, sometimes too watery…. but this time it was perfect – clearly the baby bear’s choice. Choose it from the Sides menu. It was thick and very garlicky and a joy to eat and ….if I haven’t said this before, a largish portion for a “side”. We ordered two parathas to eat it with – on the suggestion of the waitress we didn’t over order these as they do go dry and biscuitty.

We were hungry when we sat down so we also ordered Pork Cheek Vinadloo with fennel, date & pork skin chaat. This was after agreeing with the waitress that it was more like the Goan version than the “blow-the-top-off-male-bravado” type. The fennel added crispness to the soft meat. I tend to steer away from pork because it is so often over-cooked but this was really good. There were some hefty bits of pork scratchings in the mix so beware of your teeth. Perhaps they might scrunch it up a bit more.

Pilau rice – too often a funny colour and overly flavoured but in this case it was again….perfect.

We washed everything down with a fresh lime soda – sweety and salty and their signature cocktail – Dark Matter (green chilli rum, mango, pink peppercorns). Both delicious and although I approve of no straws the Dark Matter ice cubes made my top lip go numb. We followed this with a couple of beers.