Next stop the Caribbean

Chef Damion Brown will not be running with the pack when he opens Jonkanoo in the next week at 583 Crown Street, Surry Hills. Brown has taken a high-roller punt.

His restaurant will pinpoint less-known culinary destinations such as Haiti, and Trinidad and Tobago. The Jamaican-born chef, who grew up in Brooklyn, joked Caribbean food is about the only thing he can see Sydney does not have already covered.

As a final coat of Caribbean colours was being splashed on Jonkanoo's interior, Brown waxed about the mofongo, soused mackerel and Haitian griot pork, all of which will be on the opening menu.

He will also offer a big line in rums when the premises gets a liquor licence. Jonkanoo slides into the former site of Pazzo, which served a more familiar cuisine in these parts: Italian.