Ordering soup takes on a whole different meaning at Bristol’s new Nigerian restaurant

.I loved Kalabash, the now-closed Nigerian restaurant on Cheltenham Road, not least because most of the menu was randomly unavailable – even specials. The food was great, though, so when a Nigerian business appeared in the John’s Cafe site on Midland Road, I’d been looking forward to the pepper-burn pleasures of eating there.

Iroko has kept John’s clean minimalism, leaving an Afrobeat soundtrack and the exotic (to us) menu to establish the African mood. We three chums agree to share starters while puzzling over the sketchily descriptive menu. I’m all for nkwobi, described as ‘spiced cowfoot’ but reckoned to be goat’s head by a helpful Nigerian diner beside us. I still want it, whatever. Other choices were moin-moin (steamed bean cake) and a fry-up of peppers and chicken gizzards. There’s a big selection of main-course ‘soups’, all with meat or fish and various yam or semolina accompaniments, plus yam dishes and rice dishes including the legendary jollof rice.

The guy next door shows us his edikang ikong soup - a mass of dark vegetable on a ground rice base with chunks of fried fish on top and nothing liquid about it. It’s when we order that I get deja vu – nkwobi is off, chef’s specials will take 40 minutes, there are no yam dishes… our careful selections crumble away and we’re left picking between soups. We order drinks - palm wine is off but African Guinness is splendidly ‘on’ – and await the food.

From this point on, everything is great, however. Our starters arrive promptly and sizzling, with the gizzards spicy and tender, the moin-moin a satisfying sponge of ground beans flavoured with dried crayfish. The hastily chosen asun’s goat meat chunks are embellished with raw red chilli and snatch at our tongues, as the menu had warned. Our soups – egusi, edikang ikong and efo riro - are subtly different, delicious and best eaten with fingers, tearing lumps from the doughy pounded yam to pinch up with dark spinachy vegetables, picking apart fried telapia, chicken and (my choice) golden honeycomb tripe. Our extra portion of jollof rice is a mounded plate of lightly flavoured heaven adorned with dodo (fried plantain) and more fish and meat.

Great service, well-prepared and distinctive food, and £25 a head (including beers)… we’re full and happy now. Which is just as well as it seems fruit salad is… you’ve guessed it. (Tony Benjamin)

Iroko Restaurant & Bar 27-29 Midland Rd, Old Market, Bristol. Ffi: 0117 329 4462

THE VERDICT



Go with the flow and you’ll enjoy great African cuisine at a reasonable price

Copyright Tony Benjamin 2011