Rate Naija: Paris Deli

PARIS DELI, Intercontinental Restaurant
11B, Akin Adesola Street, Victoria Island
+234-803-855-5557

I’m feeling more than a little conscious now ‘cause it seems all I do when I do go out is EAT. However, you might just need to suck it up ‘cause I swear, that’s almost all there is about to do in Lagos.

Now, on to Paris Deli. When I first discovered Paris Deli, I bought into the magic. Seriously, the décor, the ambiance, the menu…I was won over, so much so that I didn’t even blink at the hefty bill when it was time to head out. Now, after subsequent outings here, the magic has faded away. 

This place, like Café Royal, has an atrocious food-to-cost ratio. I’m left after every meal thinking Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot (WTF), did I just pay….how much for that??? To be fair, they do have some mid-range affordable dishes on their menu and their pastries and desserts are sorta affordable too but overall, once you get over the initial glamor of the place, it’s all downhill from there.

Rate Naija: Café Royal

CAFÉ ROYALE, Intercontinental Restaurant
267A Etim Iyang Crescent, Victoria Island, Lagos.
+234-1-2714155 

Like I mentioned in my previous post, I’ve been to Café Royal quite the number of times so I might as well get the post about 'em over with.

I like Café Royal. I really do but...I just don't love it. I think the key reason is the food-to-cost ratio. What do I mean by that? Well, picture it like this: there’s nothing like going out to spend your hard-earned (for some of us, anyway) money on a meal and feeling like every single penny was worth it by the time you put your knife and fork down (or ask for some water to wash your hands--again, for some of us, anyway).  You know that feeling, right? It’s like that, damn, that was some good shit and I’d spend some good money again on that good shit in a heartbeat. 

I’ve gotten that great feeling in some places but I’ve never had the feeling at Café Royal . Like, the amount of money I have to spend on food in Café Royal to almost get that feeling is, more often than not, never justified to me by the end of the meal. The best it’s been is “well, that wasn’t bad at all, for once” and that was this one time when I had their blueberry pancakes, yum!

Anywayyyy, on to the verdict:

Rate Naija: Karaoke in Lagos CIty

…find a good karaoke spot in Lagos?

So this one time, my darling E, for some reason, got a bug in her head about wanting to entertain both friends and strangers with her…voice, and insisted on us going out for a good ole-fashioned karaoke session (never mind that the last time I went karaoke-ing was in junior high at some random chicken place in Satellite town I went with my dad. Picture a pimply fourteen-year old crooning corny Backstreet Boys lyrics in a tortured Evita voice…yeah).

Anyway, I bravely acquiesced to her request and we set out for Café Royale. I’d been there multiple times (Rate Naija post on that coming up) but never knew they had karaoke Friday nights. I was especially curious to see how it’d pan out given that the Café Royale crowd didn’t seem to be the “let-loose” type needed for a guaranteed rocking karaoke session. 

Sure enough, it did turn out not to be your typical karaoke crowd. In fact, I’d wager that more than half of the people there weren’t there for karaoke per se but more for a meal.  So, you know, people weren’t exactly rushing for the microphone. They chose instead to dig into their calorie-ridden meals while being mildly entertained by a Middle Easterner dude with a firm, rotund potbelly who had no problem at all hogging the mic. I was quite fascinated watching him serenade himself (and the rest of us, of course) with random, unending songs in French and Arabic. He wasn’t even perturbed by the lack of interest from everyone, oh no. He was too in tune with his warbling voice to notice the rest of us karaoke-less mortals. 

Rate Naija: Talindos

TALINDOS, Intercontinental restaurant
7B, Karimu Kotun Street, Victoria Island, Lagos (look out for a black gate just before Marco Polo Restaurant)
+234-1-4613329, +234-802-365-5880

Before I jump into this review, I have to say this – I was racking my brain for the list of Nigerian products/services I’ve used since my relocation so I’d have a whole bunch of review posts rearing to go and you know what I realized? Almost everything I thought of was related to FOOD! How alarming! That kind of says a lot about what I get up to mostly in Lagos and the kind of people I roll with (excuse while I quickly step on the scale………………..um, never mind................o_O).

Anyway, back in the dreadful NYSC days, two friends of mine and I decided we wanted to splurge a little of the surplus pittance doled out to us by NYSC. Thanks to a backdated regulation that doubled the monthly NYSC pay (yeah, they would wait until our service year was over to implement that, hiss), we had a little extra in our pockets so we were feeling all fancy and decided to go to Talindos.

Rate Naija: Prime Chinese

PRIME CHINESE, Chinese restaurant
Plot 860 Bishop Aboyade Cole Street, Victoria Island, Lagos
+234 1-270-6655

Pros:

1. Good fast-food type Chinese food, by Lagos standards. Their sizzling meat dishes and their hot sauce get grade-A points from me.
2. 24-hour service. I came here once after a long night of clubbing and the food never tasted better- hot, fresh and tasty! Disclaimer - I may or may not have had a tad too much to drink.

Cons:

1. Drinks are rather pricey. This is not exclusive to Prime Chinese though. Drink prices in Lagos are almost always through the roof.
2. Delivery kind of sucks. I ordered the other day and not only was one of the dishes I requested for not the right one but they also forgot to include the chili sauce I specifically requested for. It’s the little things, folks, and me minus my chili sauce = no fun and games

Areas for improvement:
Aside from making sure that they get the customer’s order right to the exact degree, I can’t think of much else.

3.6 stars out of 5

Have you been to Prime Chinese? Your thoughts, good or bad?

Addendum: So, Prime Chinese opened up shop in the same building as the relatively new Lekki guesthouse, Road 41. I haven’t had a sit-in experience there yet but I stopped by once to get take-out, only to sit through over 20 minutes of yelling and demonstrating by some manager-type dude over the construction (and he was doing so in this faux hybrid accent I couldn’t make head or tail off o_O). It was rather off-putting and unprofessional, and the rest of the staff scampering about at the sound of his voice sure didn’t make it better. The latter seemed apologetic though, and the chef gave me a larger portion of fried rice and an extra spring roll for my trouble so ah,well.

L.

Welcome to Rate Naija

When I first relocated home, a friend and I had started a blog detailing riotous stories of the BEEG MOVE home. A key feature of that blog was the “Rate Najia” series. Our premise for starting the series? Well, E and I were  deathly terrified of selling out, you know, becoming those returnees who begin to respond to every act of mediocrity (that, sadly, seems to have become the norm with most Nigerian products and services) with the standard, infuriating response, “Well, it’s Naija…” to which I almost always couldn’t help responding to with a forceful “SO WHAT?”

We decided then that we didn’t want to be part of those people who rant and rant and rant about everything  and do NOTHING either so in the interest of that, we launched the RATE NAIJA series where we tried to constructively critique any Nigerian-owned/based product and/or service based on our experiences with said product/service. We wanted to fight back against mediocrity in our own small way and hold businesses to accountability as should be typically.

Unfortunately, time and life kind of got in the way so we became quite lax in updating that blog. However, it was always something I wanted to re-launch when I got the chance (I am an avid fan of Yelp, Foodler, Amazon and pretty much any decent review / rating system so this is actually fun for me) which is why I have now created a new, dedicated site for Rate Naija. So yay, cue applause, I haven’t sold out yet!