New itsu miso caramel and chocolate buns

New restaurant: Infusion Village in Purley

Spotted this new restaurant in Purley so as a foodie had to pay it a visit.

As the name suggests, they serve fusion dishes which are a English with an Indian twist.

All the dishes are halal and they have English Breakfast with turkey bacon etc as well as jacket potatoes with keema and cheese.

Since I have already had halal breakfast elsewhere, I opted for the jacket potato with keema and cheese.

However I was a bit disappointed that the keema was dry and not like bolognese or chilli con carne.

Overall, I think they are still in teething stages so the menu will get changed and popular items will stay.

Stargazy pie at The Barley Mow by Cubitt House

It's National pie week so I am truly excited because pies get justice.

There's East London style served with mash and liquor or just pie with mash and gravy.

I've have been meaning to try the Stargazy pie which is rare these days.

A Stargazy pie is made with sardines, eggs and potatoes with sardine heads poking out the top edges of the pie as if they were gazing at stars.

What brought me to the Cubitt House chain was their Stargazy pie launched for pie week which I feel uncomfortable addressing as a Stargazy pie because the ingredients are different.

I suppose it makes sense for Cubitt House to use langoustines as this is one of their offerings on the menu.

But anyway, I still had to try it even though it is filled with chicken and Dublin prawn for the sake of it.

I was definitely the first person to order this as they staff were literally just given briefings about it.

£25 is a bit expensive but it delivered, the pie, mash and gravy were all good but just not the name.

Starting from the garlic mash, it was green with finely chopped grassy green spring onions and it was tasty and well balanced in terms of flavour, garlic and butter whilst having a potato taste.

Next the star of the show, the pie, although the pastry was quite thick and heavy, the chicken and Dublin Bay prawn were good and the pastry was crisp and soft on the inside and somehow it felt like there was some suet in it.

Even though, the pastry was quite thick for a small pie, there was quite a lot of chunky chicken and what you would expect from a langoustine so not much cavity in the pie.

The chicken filling was flavourful and it didn't really need the gravy but having the gravy took it to another level as it tasted like a lobster bisque gravy with some alcohol.

So overall, although it was pricey, all the elements didn't let you down.

As well as the fantastic pie, their restaurant menu upstairs is also worth checking out with lamb crumpets with anchovy mayo, pie mash with parsley sauce, deep fried oysters etc.

I also spotted some white strawberries which happened to be pickled and served with cheese.

The staff really made my day and let me try one.

The pickled strawberry taste was quite different to how I imagined it to be, it was not that sharp but sweet and sour like pickled plum.