Picture of African Kitchen, NW1 2HN

Historical version 1 of African Kitchen, NW1 2HN (view current version)

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 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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Last visited by Kake, September 2010.
OS X co-ord: 529373 OS Y co-ord: 182581 (Latitude: 51.526821 Longitude: -0.134830)
This is version 1 (as of 2010-10-19 12:56:00). View current version.