Caribbean Scene

Caribbean scene is a restaurant in the Royal Victoria Dock, London. It is not particularly promising, from the outside. You might think that the glass fronted restaurant, under a skyscraper in the heart of conference-centre docklands, is a bad sign – you might turn your nose up at the fake palm roof inside, or the reggae playing.

Wow, would you ever be wrong.

This restaurant has to be in my top ten places I have ever eaten, and I’ve been pretty lucky on that score. For a start, the food is incredible. I didn’t actually know I liked salt fish and ackee, and I had no idea that cou cou was one of the nicest foods in the world. Nicely presented, generous portions – what more could you want?

The best, friendliest service I’ve had, ever. That’s what you might want. They can do that too. The staff are friendly, attentive without being all over you, and the manager can be bothered to train the new staff properly. I’ve never had better service, ever.

And the wine was great, which might explain why my colleague and I decided that there was no way we could put the meal on expenses, then that we didn’t mind paying for it ourselves, and then that dessert was a good idea, and then that a second bottle of wine was in order.

This place is definitely not cheap, but the whole bill came to about £100 for two people having three courses and a bottle of wine each. And possibly coffee, but I’m not entirely sure. For food that good this is perfectly reasonable.

I would absolutely go back, any time I had a conference to go to in Excel London or in Canary Wharf.