A NEW Caribbean diner is set to open in Bradford city centre next month, and will offer traditional Caribbean cuisine, as well as re-invented dishes with a 'modern twist.'

The new eatery, called Kokobay Caribbean will open inside Sunbridge Wells underground quarter in April. Owner, Errol Watson, who has grown up in Bradford said the "centre of town is missing this kind of food" and it is "definitely in demand."

"The reason we decided to do it is because I'm quite disappointed with the lack of Caribbean cuisine especially in the city centre. It's definitely in demand and wanted by people in Bradford, so I decided to do something different.

"It's going to have traditional Caribbean cuisine, some new, reinvented Caribbean cuisine and different Caribbean cocktails too. We'll have things like curried goat which everyone already knows, jerk chicken and also new dishes that we have created such as stuffed dumplings with things like chicken and tuna fish inside and creoles, and also some vegetarian food."

Mr Watson, who is Jamaican himself but came over to England and has lived in Bradford since he was seven, highlighted how the new venue will be a diner rather than just a bar, and all of the food will be cooked by a chef on the premises.

He said that it's not his first business venture, as he opened a Caribbean restaurant called Cocobana in Bradford in previous years, has owned a "couple of pubs" on Manor Row when "it was the place to go" in the city centre, but has spent the past 20 years in Spain, opening bars over here.

But now he has returned to where he grew up to give Bradford a taste of the Caribbean.

He added: "There will be Caribbean music playing in the diner, and we will have Caribbean nights now and again too and we will offer a bit of a takeaway service for people too, if people don't want to sit in. "

The the new eatery will be open five days a week, from Tuesday until Saturday inside Sunbridgewells.

Sunbridgewells is a underground retail complex in the city centre that houses a number of pubs, bars, shops and restaurants.

It aims to give both new and seasoned entrepreneurs in the Bradford area a place to trade, with in and out flexible trading terms in the heart of the city centre.