There really can’t be a better way to spend a rainy Autumnal Sunday afternoon than at Notting Hill’s most colourful venue The Rum Kitchen as part of the London Restaurant Festival.
It’s the sort of place I’d have expected to find on a beach along the beaches of Saint Lucia, but instead, they’ve made their home on All Saints Road, Notting Hill.
Their decor is on point, with colourful wooden walls, quirky furniture in the upstairs bar and down in the party-time basement there’s good reggae and lots of rum. Their laid-back atmosphere is what you’d expect with some chilled reggae tunes, and the distinct smell of spices and rum travelling through the restaurant.
The mismatched seating and patterns alongside the walls, emblazoned with patois phrases, make for a very colourful and Jamaican atmosphere!
The menu on offer is wonderful with an array of dishes including jerk chicken, wings, burgers, red snapper, shredded salads, saltfish fritters and sweet potato fries. The rum menu is even more extensive, with lots of choice of imported rums and beers from Jamaica and Barbados.
We stopped here for dinner after a busy day exploring London and opted for the London Restaurant Festival deal which included a 2-course meal with welcome rum punch for only £20 per person. To start we both opted for the Jerk BBQ Wings and all are served with pickled chillies and sesame seeds. They were divine with an incredible flavour and got our Jamaican experience off to a great start!
Then for mains, I opted for the West Indian Vegetable Curry of the Plates section of the menu. My dish was a curry with yellow and red peppers, sweet potato chunks and coconut milk, and topped off with coconut flakes, rice and peas. The dish, even though light, was incredible with so many different flavours. The dish wasn’t exactly as described on the menu, as it didn’t come with chickpeas but was still a lovely dish.
And Theo opted for the Chicken Supreme, which was chicken breast cooked on the bone with sweet potato mash, callaloo and incredible jerk gravy. Theo said it tasted like real home-cooked food, with delicate flavours.
We had no room for pudding after we’d finished our mains, so had another cocktail off their extensive drinks menu before heading back over to Euston.
The Rum Kitchen is a fantastic place to hang out in, chat with friends, drink cocktails and devour some amazing Jamaican food. The drinks are also authentic and were great to end the weekend! And next time I visit, instead I will be downstairs in the basement dancing to Reggae tunes until the early hours of the morning.
**From 1-31 October, book amazing dining experiences for less at London Restaurant Festival 2018. Discover Michelin-starred restaurants, jaw-dropping views & win a gastronomic trip to Thailand.
