Three may be a crowd, but four? That’s an orchestra - when it comes to crickets, that is. Kricket Canary Wharf is the latest addition to Will Bowlby and Rik Campbell’s empire of modern Indian restaurants, joining Krickets in Soho, Brixton Market, and White City. Next door is the off-shoot cocktail bar SOMA, a brooding rough diamond serving polished aperitifs and late-night cocktails. The ‘Orange’, a cocktail of twice-distilled rum clarified orange yoghurt, is especially good.
There’s another SOMA in Soho, but Kricket Canary Wharf marks a change in pace for the group. Unlike the cosy muted interiors of other Krickets, the restaurant stands as a mammoth bunker with a cheerful modern edge. Illuminated by bright upright bulbs, a striking pepper-red kitchen counter hogs the entire left side. In on the action, guests peer over it as chefs pound oiled naans into the sides of the charcoal tandoor. Elsewhere, yellow canvas screens segregate communal tables where strangers sit side by side sipping Portuguese Verdejo and tearing chilli cheese naans.
The menu is sensibly short, but it features some hard hitters. Keralan fried chicken is always a favourite, but we hop from samphire pakoras with chilli garlic mayo to a grilled squash curry in a softly mellow makhani sauce. It’s Anglo-Indian, but there’s room for ferocity here too. Pandhi curry arrives fiendishly hot, dense with aromatics, and cushioned by melting hunks of pork neck.
Lifted by a little fried ginger, the big complex flavours are a force to be reckoned with. Not everything reaches the same heights. Bhel puri, typically crisp and crunchy, appears under a jaw-clenchingly sour tamarind sauce. The menu says raw mango, but smothered by thick layers of citrus yoghurt it goes undetected amidst the mush.
It’s barely a fortnight after opening, so there are teething problems on display. But while the paratha is burnt black and staff occasionally seem a little frazzled, these small flaws are easily fixed. On the whole, there’s some brilliant cooking going on here, with an equally attractive price tag too. Once the dust has settled, we’re confident Kricket will find its feet in Canary Wharf.