2 /5 Pranav Krishnan: Let me preface this review by saying its great that an authentic African restaurant has opened in Champaign, and more such new cuisines are a welcome improvement to the culinary richness of the area.
That said, my experience here was poor. The food is certainly an acquired taste. The egusi stew was unique and quite tasty on the whole. But the kwanga (fermented tapioca) was pungent and inedible for me, inducing a gag reflex. Be warned if you want to experiment like I did.
But that wouldnt have been a problem alone. The service and ambience was quite poor. The service staff is very inexperienced. Wait times to be attended to were long (it almost feels like youre intruding), and the waitress could not understand our questions or explain any of the dishes (poor English), when guidance while choosing dishes would have been welcome. For eg. They did not know what each dish contained (meat, veg, etc) or even how to describe what the dish was or tasted like, beyond its name. The internet was my friend to figure out what each dish was, but a human guide wouldve been nice. Food was also unreasonably pricey imo.
Overall, Im glad I tried something new, but 2 stars because I would not return.
