This Year’s African Restaurant Week Shines a Spotlight On Lesser-Known Dishes
Despite the Bay Area’s legendary culinary diversity, there are probably only a handful of African dishes that have made it into our region’s mainstream food lexicon. As Kemi Tijaniqudus, chef-owner of Nigerian food truck Jollof Kitchen, tells it, most Bay Area foodies are familiar with a few classic Ethiopian dishes, and they may have at least tried jollof rice.
Apart from that, though? There’s a wide array of African cuisines that don’t get nearly as much recognition.
So, the third annual Bay Area African Restaurant Week, which kicked off last week, aims to offer diners a bit of a culinary education. The event will focus, in part, on promoting the less widely known cuisines of Tanzania, Cameroon and Gambia, for instance. Diaspora cuisines, from countries like Jamaica and Trinidad, will also be highlighted. The promotion runs through Sept. 27.
“We want to give more people the spotlight,” says Tijaniqudus, who has co-organized the event for the past three years together with Akin Akinsanya, whose New York–based company promotes similar African Restaurant Week events all over the U.S.
The restaurant week celebration has two different components: one for restaurants and another for pop-ups and catering companies that don’t have a permanent brick-and-mortar space. Several participating restaurants, including spots KQED readers will recognize like 9jaGrills (Nigerian) and Swahili Spot (Tanzanian/East African), are offering a 10% discount through the end of the week. African Restaurant Week is also running a promotion on Instagram where diners can win food vouchers for the closing festival at Oakland’s For the Culture on Sunday, Sept. 27, from noon–7 p.m..
That festival is the showcase for pop-ups, caterers and food trucks — the non-brick-and-mortar component of the event, which is where you’ll encounter much of the Bay Area’s most dynamic and hard-to-find African cooking. Sunday’s lineup, in particular, embodies that spirit of highlighting lesser-known African dishes. It will include food vendors representing Gambia, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Trinidad and Jamaica, along with several Nigerian food businesses.
One of those, Alake Cuisine, will serve amala, a kind of black swallow, similar in texture to fufu, that’s made with yam skins. A local delicacy in Nigeria, the dish typically accompanies a stew made with jute leaves and salted meat. Another vendor, Charcoal Smoke Barbecue, will serve Cameroonian suya (grilled meat skewers), made with a slightly different spice mix than the Nigerian version.
Bay Area actress and comedian Joy Ofodu will emcee the event, and a full lineup of DJs (Dusky Rebel, Flygerian Jeff and DJ Leon) will be on hand to spin Afrobeats, reggae, dance hall and more.
African Restaurant Week will run from Sept. 17–27. The closing festival will take place on Sunday, Sept. 27, noon–7 p.m., at For the Culture (701 Clay St., Oakland). The event is ages 21+ only. Admission is free; all food and beverages will be sold a la carte.