Swahili Cuisine | The Best Places We Visited
I can’t begin this post with the ‘Top restaurants in Kenya’, because truth be told, we ate at a lot of places that were far from our favourite. We did lots of looking around, and asked for many recommendations. We got some great recommendations, some bad ones, and at other times, we cooked for ourselves at our self catering apartment.
Here is a list of all the places we ate at…Good and Bad!
1) Java House – Java house was a local, nice and chilled spot we ate at. We weren’t aware they were a franchise until a little later on throughout the week. The ambience was great, with seating available indoors, outdoors and upstairs. The food was O.k, of course some dishes were better than others, and the prices were fair. Overall, Java house was a good place to stop for brunch.
2) Mama Siti Cafe. Now, we were recommended this eatery by a local shopkeeper in Nyali City mall. We were hungry, but we wanted something different, and something someone recommended. Nevertheless, we took the lady’s word for it and headed to Mama Siti Cafe. The place was fairly full, so we thought that was a good sign. We waited a while for our dishes, and we ordered Chicken curry, goat biryani, with rice and more. It was far from our favourite, but considering the cheap prices we understood why.
3) CJ’S in Nairobi. Now, this was our favourite spot we ate at. The decor, the attention to detail, the waitresses, the food, and the price! Everything was perfect, and CJ’S was also recommended to us by one of our Uber drivers. It’s a great spot, and somewhere I’d definitely return.
4) KFC! Now, don’t get me started.. This KFC is closer to the Caribbean KFC’s than the English one. The chicken was spicy, crispy, fresh and cooked to perfection. But when my family ordered a 21 piece bucket, it lasted us more than just that day! The price was reasonable (around £17), but we ate at home after it was collected for us.
5) Shimba Hills Restaurant. After our Safari trip, we were taken to lunch, which was included in the ticket prices. Our safari ticket included a three course meal, so because we were a party of 4, we decided to get different things and taste each other’s food! Some of the dishes were a hit (especially the soup) and some were not necessarily a miss, but just O.K like the steak and chips. Overall, the meal was decent, and we were happy it was included in the ticket prices.
6) Moonshine Bar. Now, we couldn’t come to Mombasa without visiting Moonshine Bar, but more than anything, we couldn’t wait to try the meals. We were lucky we got in to be honest, but that’s a story for another day!!! We had a look at the menu, which seemed quite varied and the prices were ok. We ordered some samosa, chips, and burgers and the price for 3 came to 6000 KES which was about £35 – that’s pretty cheap especially as we all ordered drinks.
7) The HOT counter at the grocery store – Now, please don’t judge. We needed a quick meal to eat when we got home, and we were out shopping so we each picked a meal from the hot counter. They had a wide variety of dishes, and the prices were great. Our meals came to around £2 each! We chose the Ugali with beef, the chicken and chips dish, the eggs, sausage and dumpling, and the hot dog dish, and to be honest, the food was better than some of the restaurants we ate at! So don’t knock it until you try it!!
Unfortunately, we didn’t find any traditional Swahili restaurants that we absolutely loved. Have you? If so, drop all those hidden gems in the comments, so I can check them out upon my return!
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If you enjoyed reading this post, Check out our food review for Shimba Hills Lodge Restaurant!
With Love,
Siobhan Patrina
