African Kitchen, NW1 2HN
- 102 Drummond Street, NW1 2HN (streetmap) (osm) (gmap) (bingmap) (streetview)
African restaurant and art gallery on Drummond Street near Euston Station.
It's quite small inside, with only a dozen seats (they also do takeaway). The floor is varnished boards, and African masks and other art items hang on the walls (all for sale).
The food menu photo 1, menu photo 2 is all pre-prepared, and reheated in the bank of microwaves at the back of the tiny kitchen area.
Kake visited on a Tuesday lunchtime in September 2010. Arriving around 1pm, I was the only customer for my entire visit. There was no music playing when I arrived, but the owner put some on after he'd taken my order.
I had the ewa jombolo (steamed tilapia in tomato sauce with beans and smoked prawns; £7.75) photo, accompanied by jollof rice (rice and beans, available in spicy or non-spicy versions; £2.50) photo.
The tilapia was a bit disappointing; the texture of the fish and beans was fine, but the flavour was a bit lacking. I could see the smoked (dried) prawns in the sauce, but they didn't seem to have imparted any flavour, and similarly although I could see bits of red chillies, there was no detectable chilli flavour or heat. Apparently they have a homemade extra-hot sauce that you can ask for, which might have helped, but I didn't know this at the time. The jollof rice was fine, though, not suffering at all from the reheating process and with plenty of cinnamon flavour.
All their dishes are dairy-free, and the owner confirmed that the vegetarian dishes are also vegan.
Accessibility: A ramp to get in. Toilets are down a steep narrow staircase with a handrail and a bend in the middle. It's not obvious when you get down there where the toilet light switch is — it's a pull-rope just inside the door.
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