From a 16-seat restaurant in Colombo to a 90-seat opening in Canary Wharf, Apinash Sivagumaaran has built ISSO around one overlooked ingredient: the prawn. He tells The Knife why he calls it the “wagyu of the sea”, which curry tastes like home and what he wants London to discover about Sri Lankan food.

Burgher curries in Hastings. Uyghur noodles in Leicester. Nepali dumplings in Aldershot. Beyond Britain’s curry houses and tapas bars lies a hidden culinary landscape shaped by migration, identity and survival. The Knife travels the UK in search of its most underrepresented cuisines and the restaurants preserving centuries of history, one plate at a time.

He spent years avoiding the Sri Lankan Burgher side of his cooking. Now it’s the foundation of one of Britain’s most compelling new restaurants. In this exclusive interview with The Knife, Jack Lury talks about identity, lockdown reinvention, cooking entirely alone for 10 guests a night, and why Hastings – not London – became home to his quietly ambitious restaurant.