Served sunny side up

Cottons has expanded its empire. The Caribbean restaurant in Camden now has a younger sibling with the launch of Cottons Islington, which has set-up its stall in the much-lauded restaurant quarter of Exmouth Market.

It has taken 21 years for Cottons to spread its wings so the owners are hoping to make a big fuss about the new venue but they're having to compete with another addition to the area, The Ambassador, which has attracted all the attention for its no-nonsense British food.

Cottons Islington has been designed to 'capture the tropical ambience of the West Indies' and claims to mix Caribbean, Spanish, Indian and French influences and present them in a 'nouvelle cuisine style'.

Upstairs, there is the main dining area and lounge bar and downstairs is Rum Jungle, a bar that boasts over 150 rums from all over the world and which hosts regular comedy and Caribbean music nights.

The music is just as much a focal point upstairs and a loud reggae soundtrack greets customers as they enter the dining room, which has been decorated with sunnier climes in mind. Colourful paintings hang on burnt orange walls, yellow flowers are dotted across the white table cloths and yellow-stained windows trick you into thinking you are relaxing in the setting Caribbean sun rather than rainy, grey old Islington.

The sunny disposition continues with the list of exotic cocktails - elaborate multi-coloured concoctions with names like Reggae Rum Punch and Caribbean Yellowbird - and the menu holds the promise of further tropical delights.

An Island Meze starter was more than enough for two people and offered a choice of Creole seafood mix, dominated by tough chunks of squid; chewy, salty akkra fritters; a dollop of aubergine choka; and a colourful salad sweetened with pineapple, plus a corn wrap should you wish to bundle it up and consume in one go.

A second starter of ackee and saltfish came beautifully wrapped in banana leaf, which unfurled to reveal tasty, steamed fish with fiery chilli sauce and little dumplings, which were the only things on the plate that lacked a bit of oomph.

For main course, the goats cheese dish was a tower of layers, with perfectly cooked sweet potato cake resting under a thick ring of pineapple, a layer of spinach and a generous topping of grilled cheese, served with sweet chilli jam. The pineapple and cheese combination works well (it hasn't earned a reputation as a party finger-food favourite for nothing) and each mouthful brought a different mix of flavours, though the seemingly never ending pineapple became a little sickeningly sweet.

Next up was the 'famous' curried goat served with traditional rice and peas - a dish that conjured-up images of tough-as-old boots meat but which thankfully contained delicate, tender chunks, although the odd bit of bone had crept in here and there. After the riot of flavours and colours of the previous dishes, it seemed to lack the wow factor somewhat - a good old reliable dish that strangely made us yearn for a few more pineapple chunks.