The Cocochine

I have written previously about The Cocochine and its chef/patron Larry Jayasekara, who is originally from Sri Lanka. The restaurant is in a Mayfair town house, with the dining options set over three levels. At this visit we were in the main room rather than the counter seating around the open kitchen upstairs. There is an a la carte menu, and a very well-priced three course lunch at £39, but we went for the full signature menu at £185 per person.

The meal began with a canape. Coronation langoustine was served with served with kafir lime. A coronation-style mix is made using diced Rowler farm apples, curry leaves, home-made curry mayonnaise, Earl Grey tea-soaked raisins, toasted nibbed almonds and coriander. This is all mixed with langoustine and served on a thin crisp, dusted with toasted curry powder and pink shiso leaves from the farm. Coronation chicken is a well proven dish, and this version with shellfish works equally well (17/20).

Two breads were offered: onion brioche and sourdough. The home-made brioche uses flour from Rowler farm, the bread laminated four times then layered with caramelised onions and thyme julienne of curry leaves and a touch of roasted cardamom powder. This is baked and at each service the bread is lightly steamed, to produce a very soft warm bread. Once this emerges from the steam it is glazed with brown butter and sea salt. The sourdough is made by starting with a porridge from oats and barley then added to the mother dough. The 95% hydration gives an airy texture yet with a thin crust. Once the bread is baked it is glazed with kithul (sap made from a palm tree flower in Sri Lanka) and sea salt. This is served with Normandy butter. These are both high class breads. 

Ceylon crab curry salad was the first formal course of the meal. A mixture of Dorset crab and king crab is diced and mixed with natural yogurt, curry leaves, lime zest, and diced apple that is grown on Rowler farm. This is topped with apple jelly, naran (a small lime that is from the same family as kalamansi), coriander and flowers from the farm. This is finished with Ceylon crab consommé that is chilled. A Ceylon crab curry is made using blue crab from Sri Lanka (sourced from the Sri Lankan market in Wembley) then clarified to be a consommé. This dish has delicate texture, the acidity of the apple balancing the natural sweetness of the crab, while the crab consommé gives depth to the dish (17/20).

Steak tartare was served with caviar in a banana leaf. The beef was not cut too fine, the seasoning was excellent, and the caviar contrasted nicely with the flavour of the beef (17/20). Next was roasted wild turbot with spiced coconut and wild tiger prawn sauce. With turbot, the bigger the fish the better the flavour as a rule: little 2kg turbots that often turn up on London plates have very little flavour. In this case the fillet came from a huge 14.6kg wild turbot caught near Tanera Island. This was aged for about four days then seasoned with home-made curry powder, spices and seaweed powder. This was garnished with Sri Lankan coconut sambal, lime juice, thin potato crisps, garden herbs and a pool of wild tiger prawn sauce with lemon verbena oil. On the side was a kind of turbot and beef bolognaise using the turbot trimmings and beef trimmings with tomato, onion, celery, carrots, chilli and fish stock, all blended and used to flavour a seaweed brioche (17/20). 

Grilled lobster served in a banana leaf was next, served on a rice pot with spices. This is a Sri Lankan take on kedgeree, this version using banana leaf barbecued native lobster, with tomato and tamarind rice pot and soft poached quail egg. The native lobsters are caught around Tanera Island, typically weighting around 400-500g. These are blanched in seaweed for a minute or two and plunged into ice water. The shells are removed and the lobster meat is wrapped in a Sri Lankan banana leaf. This is barbecued over Japanese binchotan charcoal and glazed with ginger and lobster sauce. To finish there is micro planed fresh lime zest and citrus gel. Finally, there is a rice pot with tomato, lobster, fresh tamarind sauce. The rice used is called Samba rice from Sri Lanka that is partly boiled and cooked in spiced lobster stock. To this is added butter, lobster claw meat, soft poached quail egg, micro coriander and a lobster and citrus emulsion. This is a lovely dish, the lobster being very tender and the ginger and lobster sauce flavouring the rice. This dish tasted particularly good tonight (strong 17/20). 

The final savoury course was 20 day dry aged loin of lamb (again sourced from Rowler farm) with parsley puree, confit Datterini tomatoes (a sweet variety of plum tomato) and black pepper relish, roasted lamb and tomato jus. The lamb is dry-aged on the bone and marinated with butter milk, toasted coriander and rosemary for two days to further tenderise the meat. The meat is roasted and glazed with fresh tamarind, then topped with black pepper chutney. This is served with confit Datterini tomatoes, parsley and onion purée. The dish is finished with roast lamb and tomato jus. This jus is based on a veal stock with roasted veal knuckles, onions, carrots, celery, garlic and thyme that is covered in white chicken stock and cooked for 24 hours. The veal stock is added to the roasted lamb bones and cooked for a further 8 hours, and reduce consistency. This forms the base for the sauce. Next, the kitchen roasts the lamb trimmings, carrots, banana shallots, garlic, leeks, celery, covers with veal and lamb stock and cooks this for three hours. To this is added fresh tomatoes, thyme, rosemary and reduced white wine, cooked for a further half an hour and and then passed through a sieve. The flavour is adjusted with lemon juice, salt, and roasted lamb fat. As can be seen, there is a great deal of effort that goes into the sauce, and this really showed up in the flavour, which was deep and went really well with the meat, which had very good flavour and was lightly cooked to a pink colour. This was a seasonal and very enjoyable celebration of lamb (17/20). This came with essentially a large single potato chip, which had excellent texture.

Pre-dessert was Sri Lankan pineapple, lime and lemongrass sorbet, coriander oil, sea salt, finger lime, and Sri Lankan long red chilli flakes. At the base of the cup in which it was served were fresh diced pineapple and lime segments. This dish is a nod to vendors in Asia, who sell mangoes or pineapple with salt and chilli to travellers. This dish works very well as a pre-dessert, as it is very refreshing, which is surely the whole point of a pre dessert. The balance of salt and chilli along with the acidity of the fruit is carefully balanced (16/20). Lemon parfait was made with Amalfi lemons. The texture here was silky and the balance of sweetness and sharpness from the lemon acidity was spot on (17/20).

Service was very professional and welcoming throughout. The bill came to £233 per person. This was another excellent meal here, with a distinctive amalgam of classical French technique combined with touches of Sri Lanka. The high standard of ingredients here really sets it apart from most London restaurants.   

Further reviews: 05th May 2026 | 10th Mar 2026 | 22nd Jan 2026 | 11th Dec 2025 | 18th Nov 2025 | 09th Sep 2025 | 15th May 2025 | 22nd Mar 2025 | 05th Apr 2024