Become a croc hunter at Empire

It's an enterprising 21-year-old who opens his own restaurant. But it's an absolutely remarkable one whose restaurant heroically laughs in the face of restaurant conventions, such as Iqbal Hussein, owner and chef of Empire. Far from being the supremely confident type we expected from this act of chutzpah, he's a quiet, angelic-faced boy who appears to simply have a passion for the extremely curious food he produces.

Fusion, he says. An odd choice in the first place when everyone who attempts this style - with the honourable exception of Peter Gordon at The Providores - leaves themselves open for torrents of critical abuse. But even stranger is the fusion itself: an unholy alliance between the Far East, the Continent and Regent's Park Zoo.

When was the last time you spotted zebra on a menu? Or kangaroo? Or, for goodness sake, ants and scorpions? Dishes - such as the loopy crocodile dumplings with Jerusalem couscous and hoi-sin sauce, or cobra risotto - appear to make no kind of sense whatsoever.

Aficionados of the arcane might have encountered its like at the Birdcage (now Archipelago and following the same formula); so it's no surprise to find out that Iqbal learned his trade there.

Rarely have I been so unnerved by a menu, not helped by the stony-faced chap - Iqbal's dad? - who sat immobile at the next table, glowering into the night. We had to fob off our delightful Polish waitress time and time again, unable to choose between dishes we found ourselves categorising as 'sounds safe' or 'could be edible'. (We asked her if she'd tried everything, which she had. So what's the cobra like? 'Actually,' she replied, 'I prefer rattlesnake.')

Comparatively, my starter fell into the 'safe' category: excellent lozenges of seared salmon given fragrance by their wrap of aromatic betel leaf and savouriness by a soy dip. My companion's, on the other hand, was positively dangerous: a tall glass containing fronds of floppy seaweed, shards of crabmeat, mussels, squid and quail's egg, all in fish broth. On top was floating a small glass phial of what looked like Class A drugs - complete with straw.

It turned out to be powdered pearl which, according to Chinese medicine, has anti-ageing and aphrodisiac qualities; when added to the soup, it rendered it murky and swampy. The whole thing tasted of pond.

I fared better on the main-course front too: my kangaroo with wild cherry sauce and dandylion (sic) salad was really rather good, the springy (sorry) meat gamey and slightly sweet, the salad astringently bitter and the sauce jammy. But what seemed like a conservative choice of lamb with pesto rice brought eyewateringly chilli-hot, fatty meat.

Our ant rice - yes, that's rice with ants - defeated me (I'm bug-phobic, not squeamish) but my far braver companion shovelled down the creepycrawlies then complained that she could feel their jaggy little legs going down her throat.

By the time we'd got to chocolate-coated scorpions embellished with edible platinum leaf, I'd drunk enough to venture one of its extremities. Not an edifying experience. (I took the bugs into work next day to see if someone butcher than me would give it a go; the verdict: 'Crispy. Chewy. Like chocolate with legs.')