Website: https://www.kricket.co.uk/soho/
Closest Underground Station: Piccadilly Circus
Cuisine: Indian
Price Range: ££

When a colleague leaves work, you’re either glad to see the back of them or you wonder how you’re going to cope without your daily dose of bantz.  ‘Oatcake’ falls into the second category, so after a month apart we decided to catch up and try somewhere tasty for dinner at the same time.

Kricket is a Indian tapas style restaurant,  operating on a mainly ‘walk in’ basis, which means that you can be left waiting for an hour or so before you are seated. Oatcake and I had plenty to catch up on, so we put our names down and explored Carnaby Street and the surrounding areas until our table was ready.

The waiter took our drinks order and explained that we should order 3-4 small plates each. We went for bhel puri, smoked aubergine, tandoori monkfish, masala kulcha, samphire pakoras, beef pickle (not pictured) and tomato pilau (not pictured).

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Normally, if I’m getting chaat, bhel puri would be low on my list. However, Kricket’s version was deliciously spiced and seasoned with lots of imli (tamarind) and  freshened up with chunks of mango. The tandoori monkfish was meaty, flavourful and delicious and the masala kulcha really hit the spot.

I’m a tad fussy when it comes to aubergine so, while this came in low on my list of favourites, it was a good dish and worth getting (especially with the sweet bursts of flavour from the pomegranate). However, the surprise treat were the samphire pakoras, which were light and crispy in comparison with their more traditional potato/gram flour cousins.

Although we were stuffed to the brim, our table was overlooking the kitchen and we had seen the chefs preparing an amazing brioche style dessert all evening. This turned out to be the shahi tudka (like Indian bread and butter pudding) with buttermilk ice cream – we just couldn’t say no.

This was the perfect sharing dessert to end the meal and, unlike most places, you could tell that serious care and attention had gone into the creation of this sweet dish. There are only two desserts on Kricket’s menu – I can’t wait to go back and try the other one.

Thanks for reading,

~Plane Emoji