Nanban, London SW9 - restaurant review: A bit of Japan, a bit of Jamaica, a ton of flavours

The buffed-up marble floors and arched windows hint at the building's 1920s origins as a theatre dining room and, more recently, a pie 'n' mash shop

Nanban, Coldharbour Lane, London

My destination is a hybrid in every sense. The food is a cultural remix: Japanese ramen getting frisky with Caribbean ingredients, under a comfort blanket of Americana. And the chef, Tim Anderson, is a kind of hybrid too: an American from Wisconsin, whose fascination with Japan led him to teach in the south of the country. Here he ate and cooked obsessively, and fell for a British girl, returning with her to settle in London.

In 2011, Anderson entered Masterchef, and Britain returned the compliment by falling a little bit in love with the wry Midwesterner and his genre-bending, borderline-OCD food. Pork ramen with truffled lobster gyoza and aromatic oils; peanut butter/jelly sandwich cake; the smorrebrod-meets-sashimi “smushi” he served the critics, nailing the Asian/Nordic trend early. It takes some balls to present burgers in the Masterchef final, but Anderson's Tri-City sliders, celebrating LA, Tokyo and London, were – triumphantly – those balls.

Since becoming Masterchef's youngest winner, Anderson has published a book of his “Japanese soul food” recipes, Nanban, and run various pop-ups. Not quite, yet, a professional chef, much more than a gifted amateur. Now, four years after he started looking for premises, here it is. Nanban the restaurant. Full of Midwestern Eastern promise.

The two-storey site on the edge of Brixton market is spartan, its buffed-up marble floors and arched windows hinting at the building's 1920s origins as a theatre dining room, and more recently, a pie 'n' mash shop. Eel is still on the menu at Nanban, thankfully nothing like the boney nightmares of old. Lightly smoked, the warmed fillets are garlanded with brined cucumber, shaved apple and deep-fried ramen, and scooshed with tongue-tingling sansho pepper.

Other dishes draw inspiration – and ingredients – from the market, which despite the relentless march of the artisan pizza joints and brunch spots, still holds plenty of stalls selling Caribbean and African specialities. A daily changing market salad is conjured from whatever is good: we get smashed Jamaican cucumber dressed Szechuan-style with black rice vinegar, garlic oil and the one-two punch of spring onion and fried garlic. Curry goat ramen is the must-order dish, presented tsukemen style, with the noodles – properly stiff and fresh under an umami-bomb sprinkling of “seafood sawdust” – served separately to be dipped into butter-soft, densely spiced meat, somewhere between a broth and a curry, holding a perfect tea-pickled egg.

Not all of the Asian/West Indian dishes come off. Ackee and saltfish croquettes, bland under their striping of katsu sauce, are a nice idea and no more. But Anderson is great on texture: the sour bite of pickled radish and cabbage against dense, miso-drenched stir-fried pigs tripe, the crunch of brown rice punctuating the honey-mirin shimmer of a grapefruit salad.

In a nod to Anderson's homeland, his famous burger – regular beef layered with strips of pork belly and American cheese and slathered with bizarro fixings – is served in a plastic diner tray with crinkle fries. It's great. Another hybrid dish – chicken karaage – sake-marinated thighs, deep-fried in ultra-dry cornflour batter, are almost showy in the amount of flavour they pack. And there's a definite touch of Jewish penicillin about the chicken ramen in an addictive soy-stiffened broth bright with ginger. I end up picking up the bowl and slurping from it. Anderson is on view in the kitchen on my first visit, when we sit downstairs on stools at a low plywood counter, admiring the gins of Brixton, a spotlit gantry of artisan liquors. On a return visit, we choose the airier but less convivial upper floor, where booths on wheels offer greater comfort and no danger of splashback from a ramen-slurping stranger.

Despite the vibe, there's nothing casual about Nanban. Everything on the menu is the product of intense deliberation and collaboration. Anderson's spoddy devotion to obscure ingredients has rubbed off on the waiting staff, who are keen to show off what they know. Every dish is encoded with Anderson's personality and passion, but there's no drop in quality when we return on his day off. The kids love ice cream-filled mochi, those stretchy, rice-flour balls which always seem like a cartoon version of dessert. And I am equally fond of the chilled shochu, which expands panoramically in combination with all those huge flavours.

As a London experience for foodish visitors, Brixton market would be my recommendation over tourist-rammed Borough. And Nanban is a great showcase for the new wave of freewheeling, globally minded cooking. It's the product of one man's magnificent obsession. And it's pretty damned magnificent.

More information

Nanban, 426 Coldharbour Lane, London SW9 (020 7346 0098)

Around £20 a head before drinks and service

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