A dream dish of duck with cavolo nero, jerk spice, rum-infused plums and hazelnuts at Wood and Water
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Wood and Water is a restaurant steeped in history. Let’s start at the very beginning, 2,500 years ago, when the Arawak group of indigenous peoples journeyed to a Caribbean island from South America. They called their new home Xaymaca, which translates as “land of wood and water”. Next, let’s take a big leap forward to London in the 1940s, when the first of the Windrush Generation of Caribbean workers arrived in the UK to fill gaps in British industries, with many finding jobs through the labour exchange on Brixton’s Coldharbour Lane.
Another few years down the line, and 21st-century Coldharbour Lane has gone from being sensationally (and misguidedly) touted as “the most dangerous street in the UK” by the Evening Standard, to becoming one of the hippest enclaves in all of London – a place of bustling bars and restaurants that backs onto the equally vibrant and cool Brixton Village Market. Despite claims that gentrification has sapped some of the original Caribbean soul from the area, you’d still struggle to find a more exciting and diverse range of eating options in most places around the world.
Into which context, let’s introduce this fabulous little restaurant for small plates, cocktails and brunches on Coldharbour Lane. It’s the second restaurant on the same site from chef April Jackson, who herself has an interesting back-story, being a Jamaican beauty pageant winner and an ex-Apprentice contestant. Three Little Birds was the name of the old restaurant. Now – as suggested by the words Wood and Water displayed proudly in gold above the door – she’s putting her spin on Jamaica’s heritage, while also mixing in all of the trendy and upmarket highlights of the modern British small plates scene. With some very stiff drinks on the side. What’s not to like?
The menu seems like many others around London at first, with confit salmon, seared duck breast and roasted cauliflower. But it’s the flavours in the smallprint that set the food apart. The duck and the cauliflower are pepped up with jerk seasoning, and those same jerk flavours – thyme, scotch bonnet, ginger – pop up in many other dishes. Plus there’s a spin on a Jamaican breakfast classic with salted cod and ackee, along with fried plantain and some stunning goat croquettes.
This is a step above fusion cooking. It’s modern British meets Jamaican, but the marriage is an extremely comfortable one. Everything sings. Notes of spice and citrus light up your palate, and with rum in your glass (and sometimes also in the food) you’re left with a very warm feeling inside. Though history inspires this place, its rooted firmly in Brixton’s present, where the meeting of different cultures is – as you’d want it to be – totally natural.
The croquettes are made with slow-cooked goat, come with a plantain ketchup and have all the mellow, fatty sweetness you’d hope for.
The roasted cauliflower is a riff on a familiar, vegan-friendly menu item, but is done much more excitingly than at most restaurants, coming as it does with beetroot hummus and jerk flavourings infused with the signature heat and sweetness of scotch bonnet chillies.
Rhum agricole (rum made from freshly squeezed sugarcane juice, originally distilled in the French Caribbean islands) livens up a fab cheesecake, that’s also laced with limoncello.
Wood and Water is a great place to meet friends for a long catch-up chat with cocktails and nibbles, or a good date night spot – it feels classy without being imposing and is one of the smarter restaurants in this part of Brixton, though it’s evidently faithful to the area’s heritage.