My African Restaurant Adventure: Post Pandemic Revised Edition

By Akon Margaret Kalu

My book is prescriptive to process change, and it outlines strategic thinking about market competition. It is a vital tool for restaurant owners who wish to embark on a practical approach to achieve growth and branding of food. The book highlights areas for improvement that might work and what may not wor

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookTrail Publishing
• Release date: Nov 3, 2020
• ISBN: 9781951505844

Akon Margaret Kalu

I am Akon Margaret Kalu, a certified nutrition coach with a master of arts degree from Goldsmiths, University of London, and a bachelor of arts from Middlesex University. I am the author of Eat with Pleasure: Celebration of Food and founder of www.therealakon.co.uk, both of which inform, inspire, educate, and share the healthy lifestyle and African food heritage. Additionally, at Akons Pop-up Kitchen (www.akonhob.simplesite.com), I share food videos live from my kitchen. I dont spend time worrying about what I shouldnt eat. I love food, love cooking, and love exploring new recipes. I believe cooking is an act that gets better with each meal, though there may be a few mishaps before you can rustle up a meal with confidence. I enjoy sharing the whole cooking experience on my websites. I love going to farmers markets to buy fresh organic ingredients, chit-chat with friendly food-stall owners, and feast my eyes on farm-fresh produce. My neighbours knock on my door rather inquisitively, asking about the intoxicating aroma of my food that fills the neighbourhood. Theres nothing like stock fish and African locust bean (parkia biglobosia) and Sierra Leones dawadawa to send up a powerful aroma that signifies theres an African in the building. The African food revolution is on the way, and hopefully non-Africans across the globe will embrace our food just like my neighbours. I live in the UK with my family. You can follow me on Twitter @margaretkalu1, Instagram @Pure5712, and Facebook at Akon Utukubok Kalu.

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Copyright © 2020 by Akon Margaret Kalu

Paperback: 978-1-951505-85-1

eBook: 978-1-951505-84-4

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020919735

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

This is a work of nonfiction.

Ordering Information:

BookTrail Agency

8838 Sleepy Hollow Rd.

Kansas City, MO 64114

Printed in the United States of America

Keyword:

… a post pandemic revised edition every

restaurant owner must read

To my grandchildren,

Nyla, Maya, Elijah and Emerson

Preface

My African Restaurant Adventure: Branding Afro Flavour is a narrative based on African food from a personal perspective, in which I share my experience of food festivals, restaurant visits, and book festivals in the UK. The insight gained is unparalleled to anything that I have ever done. It prepared me to tell Africa’s food story and share African culinary skills. It was a fact-finding mission to explore how African restaurants are struggling to survive in an industry dominated by mainstream leading brands.

I wanted to be able to tell my story and give a personal account of my encounters at every restaurant visit. Every action and reaction was documented as a point of reference without relying on any other form of research.

You don’t read much about African restaurants; it’s as if no one is remotely interested. They are cloistered in the community and have been for years, since the sixties. I felt there was a need to address lack of diversity in British food reviews and cookbooks. African food, with all its richness and variety, is still waiting to be celebrated. With its rich culture, you would have thought African food would rank among the mainstream; instead, there has been limited knowledge.

While I believe African food is just as good as other popular cuisines that should be celebrated, I also realise that to succeed and avoid all the setbacks, restaurant owners need to develop management skills and consistency in recipes. This is an example of the setbacks holding African restaurants back—a hindrance to commercialisation and branding.

With a desire to find out more and a willingness to change people’s perception about African food, I armed myself with pen and notepad and went knocking on restaurant doors to ask the management to fill me in about their businesses. I didn’t want to broach the question of why they were still behind their contemporaries in the business. That I would ask when trust and rapport had been established—with couple of revisits, if I was lucky.

Before my first visit, I had already done research about the restaurant: name, location, management, menu, staff, website where applicable, and Food Standard Agency score at the time of visit. I noticed most restaurants didn’t have Facebook and websites. Those that did have websites often had almost nothing to show but a restaurant logo. Even that logo was often lacklustre, with insufficient information about the restaurant and a lack of symbolism and emblem of a brand.

I soon realised that my task of interviewing restaurant owners was not going to be easy. I was not prepared for all sorts of disappointments. Confirmed visits could be cancelled at the last minute. Still, I felt this sort of thing shouldn’t be a deterrent to carrying on. I had a million and one unanswered questions—and absolutely no answer to any of them. Trust between me and the restaurants would be crucial to be able to overcome certain obstacles. The challenges were many and complex, as I later found out.

I also realised I could never cover all West African cuisine, not even all Nigerian foods that I had eaten as well as the unfamiliar ones I’d recently come across. I decided the best approach was to pick special popular cuisines in certain countries to get an idea of food across the board. I have painstakingly picked everyday food cooked with love that is enjoyed by most people, hence the popularity. The food descriptions are guaranteed to make you feel hungry, so make sure you have something to nibble on ready and close by.

My book is intended to promote and give literary voice and awareness to West African and African food. I hope to give it the identity and recognition it deserves. African food is a general term used to describe traditional indigenous African cuisines. Mine is a narrative of the transition from street food to casual dining to fine dining, with the underlying problems that occur. Indeed, there are many problems. Complex issues will be addressed in the narrative for your consideration.

Restaurant owners face many challenges—including capital for start-ups, staff, location, and management—that must be overcome as the first hurdles to success. The scenario is the same in most African restaurants in the UK. I found myself walking into failing restaurants and quickly identifying the problems as poor management and inexperienced staff, yet the establishment was full of hospitality.

This book aims to address major problem areas and ongoing issues causing setbacks, along with suggestions on how to make progress and move forward. These are not meant to be a universal solutions, but it would make a difference to change things round a bit. My observation as a regular diner in European, Continental, and African restaurants enables me to compare notes, as would any regular diner, based on experience and knowledge. This book is about addressing the complaints I have heard from others.

African food transformation, as seen in various pop-ups and restaurant kitchens, may be the reason this cuisine will stand the test of time. It has already started with a remix of recipes and ingredients. We are now seeing indigenous African grandma recipes infused with foreign ingredients, with ongoing food modification creating new cuisines. We have also seen advanced technology and social media as useful tools that can create awareness of West African food and its dining experience.

Meals are no longer served in large portions. Thanks to pop-up kitchens, jollof rice remixed and decorated with strange condiments on tiny plates has moved from traditional to contemporary settings. Cooking techniques are being redefined, reinvented, and revamped with new cooking techniques for a complete new dining experience. Efforts are aimed at promoting and branding Afro flavour. Pop-up kitchens and food entrepreneurs are utilising social media to the fullest, showcasing an eye-catching and impressive array of remixed dishes. Food critics and less enthusiastic food lovers are still struggling to understand this transition.

This new trend is not catching on in African restaurants, however, which have continued to run their food business the traditional way. Remix to them is not authentic; nothing can compare to indigenous African, West African, or Nigerian food. It can be a bad dining experience for diners who are used to traditional recipes modified in taste, texture, and portion. Yet restaurant owners insist that the closer the food tastes to that of the country of origin, the more authentic it is in retaining its ‘native’ taste. They insist on original recipes, not localised versions of foods.

Others who are not that enthusiastic feel food authenticity should not matter provided food tastes good. Authenticity could mean traditional or the way the natives do their cooking using indigenous native recipes as you would in home countries in Africa, or it could mean foods cooked with grandma recipes without mixing the recipes with foreign recipes. The word authentic may sounds vague because three cooks using the same recipes are unlikely to cook meals that have the same taste and texture. The aim of this book isn’t necessarily to compare contemporary remixes with traditional cuisine and decide whether to revamp or remix traditional dining. Instead, it is an attempt to examine major problem areas and make suggestions for improvement. Indeed, remixes and fusion of recipes is progressive and positive in branding of Afro flavour.

An African food explosion may be on the way, but to succeed and make a mark on the international scene, major setbacks must be overcome. Many new and self-taught cooks and business entrepreneurs are sizzling up their stoves with spicy Afro flavours, capturing the interest of the food industry at home and in diaspora. I like to think that I am one of them. This is a new way of cooking—recipes with variations for a slight change in traditional cooking techniques. Hopefully this might be the change needed to achieve recognition.

If this approach is going to change the overall image of the African food industry, I am already advocating for it. Before I arrived at my conclusion, however, I evaluated the difficulties traditional African restaurants face that have led to a need for transitioning to remixing, new tastes and textures, and a smaller portion size.

The solution might go beyond modifying the way we cook. The road to achieving the same international recognition as mainstream and leading brands will be bumpy and full of problems and obstacles. This book is intended to address and take into account my findings and facilitate change. I do not mean to use European and Continental restaurants as yardstick, paradigm, or point of reference, or to use some benchmark or measure standard like Michelin gold. My honest approach is to be open-minded in my visits and try not to dwell too much on direct comparison with non-African cuisines.

Acknowledgements

To all mothers and women who taught their sons how to cook. Master chefs, continue inspiring your missus in the kitchen.

A huge thank you to everyone who bought my debut book, Eat with Pleasure: Celebration of Food. It has had a successful run since publication in January 2017. It shares practical advice on healthy food and weight management, and it embraces the joy of eating without unnecessary restrictions.

I’m chuffed and humbled by the positive online comments and feedback. Your messages did boost my confidence to write this book. It was the lift-effect I needed when I faced what has always been a writer’s lonely moment of putting pen on paper. Many writers can relate to this, when you are on a journey writing with just you and your thoughts.

My husband, children, family, and friends have been incredibly supportive. Words alone will not suffice. I couldn’t have accomplished this book without the full support of my publishers. A big thank you to everyone on the team.

Contents

Introduction

The Concept: African Food

Health Benefits of African Food

My Solo Restaurant Visits

The Struggle

Major Problem Areas

The Struggle: Branding Afro Flavour

Dining Etiquette: The African Way

Feeding Generation Millennials

How Covid-19 Pandemic Is Reshaping Food Business

Post Pandemic Restaurants

Dining Socially Distanced

How My Social Science Background Has Shaped This Adventure

About the Author

Glossary

Index

Introduction

If you haven’t been to an African restaurant before, I would say it is a place in which you are bound to have a different dining experience. The atmosphere is laid-back; no rush or signals from the waiting staff to leave and make a table available for the next diners, as you often see in non-African eateries. Liken it to sitting on those public benches inside shopping malls. Nobody cares how long you sit there.

Don’t expect a fancy well-dressed maître-d’ to attend to you while you decide how far you can stretch your wallet. In the UK, looking in from the outside, don’t be discouraged by the run-down dilapidated buildings that most struggling owners lease or rent to start up. You may be forgiven for thinking there won’t be much to expect; however, you will be surprised by the hospitality that awaits you inside.

Expect West African music, especially from Nigeria and Ghana, plus music videos blaring away azonto, siwelele, Iyanya kukere, and shoki dance moves, a bit like a pre-party scene to set the mood before the guests arrive. Energetic Afro beats are almost deafening—so loud you can hardly hear your co-diner.

Decor is usually fun, vibrant, and bold, with carvings the usual traditional African theme. Don’t expect the minimalist modern trend of bare tables; some African restaurants are still stuck in their old ways and are over decorated with heavy curtains, colourful tablecloths, vases of artificial flowers, and dim lights like a boudoir interior.

You will certainly need help with the menu if you are a foreigner trying African food for the first time. If unsure, ask the waiting staff for clarification. Although a restaurant menu is supposed to be treated as a road map, allow the waiting staff to assist you in making the right choice.

Just to get the drift, African soup isn’t the same as the European and Continental soups you have with bread rolls as starters and appetisers. Instead, expect goat-head pepper soup, stewed cow tongue, cow tripe (intestine), stock fish, and bushmeat. All-in-one-pot broth is another soup dish; it’s cooked with an assortment of meat, fish, vegetables, spices, herbs, and seafood, paired either with fufu or pounded yam dough balls. African foods are mostly finger foods, though some people might choose not to eat with their hands and use knife and fork instead due to concerns over prying eyes. It is entirely up to an individual’s preference.

Other main courses include rice, yam, and plantain dishes—such as jollof rice, fried yam, fried cocoyam, fried dodo, and boli plantain. These delicacies are cooked with mouth watering indigenous local herbs, hot chilli, devil’s pepper, and spices. The food is incredibly spicy and presented in large portions guaranteed to fill you up with generous tasty surprises.

Desserts