Alloko Garden - Oakland

Man! This was some yummy food and a blast from the past. As a returned Peace Corps Volunteer who spent 2 years in Ivory Coast back in the 1990 's, I was thrilled to see a local restauranteuer surface who could re relate some of the flavors that tickled my taste buds back in the day. Not to hate on its neighboring countries, but after travelling widely in West Africa I concluded that Ivory Coast has a truly rockin ' and superior food culture. I 'm vegan aspirational but my partner is not, so to increase his buy-in, we ordered Shokouya Cancanan chicken. The half chicken, accompanied by delicious grilled onions and tomatoes, was a generous portion of robustly seasoned, plump, fresh and perfectly cooked chicken. I love that they only use happy chicken as I call it--cage free, hormone free antibiotic free--which assuaged some of my flesh eating hesitancy. The side dishes were just as I recalled: attieke, a marvelous cous-cous-like starch made of ground, fermented, then steamed cassava, was tangy, springy, and performed as expected in hand. In hand?, you ask? Why yes, the real way to enjoy attieke is to scoop up a small handful with your right hand, scrunch it up in a ball, then dip it in a sauce or accompany it in this case with a bit of tender chicken. It gives a taste and a mouth feel like no other. Then there was the alloko, which is a generous portion of chunks of fried plantain doux, or sweet plantain. In Côte d 'Ivoire you would likely enjoy these as streetfood, in my opinion best consumed after the heat of the day had spent itself and you were walking with your companion to take some fresh air before turning in. A street vendor would hand you a pile of these wrapped in a piece of newspaper, accompanied by a blob of paste composed improbably of fermented dried fish, ground chili pepper, oil and the omnipresent Cube Maggi. The marriage of sweet banana, spicy, umami, salty...made my toes curl just as I did 20 years ago! well, you can experience some of that magic with Alloko Garden 's alloko. Each chef has their own recipe for the alloko side sauce and I suspect the proprietor, Monsieur Tohouri, uses less heat and less fish and more natural ingredients than the MSG-fest that is Cube Maggi, for us Oaklanders than he might have grown up with. But this healthy non-volcanic version more than gets the idea across and my partner, new to alloko and its accompaniments, understood that the idea was delicious. We both loved that instead of omnipresent plastic, this alloko attieke came in a biodegradable paper box. Because he was temporarily out of one other dish that I 'd hoped to sample, Mr. Tohouri kindly added a dish for me called fonio arancini, which are kind of hush puppy type doodads made of a grain I didn 't remember encountering in my village, fonio. Even 20 minutes after picking up from the storefront in Jingletown, the fonio arancini arrived home still delicious in all the ways grain plus a dunk in a deep fryer can be: hot and crispy on the outside, warm and almost pudding-like on the inside, with a warm umami awesomeness from the cheese mixed with the dough, and a yummy dipping sauce alongside. According to the article I read in Berkeleyside, this fonio is part of an interest Monsieur Tohouri has in increasing the economic base in Côte d 'Ivoire. First step is creating market demand. I say, bring it on!! Although we were ravenous after a four hour bike ride that day, both BF and I were satisfied after this feast. I know this is the first of many trips to this place. I feel so fortunate to have an authentic source of Ivoirien cuisine in my back yard, and with an emphasis on the health of the food chain, the planet, and the humans both producing and consuming the cuisine. I ordered and picked up directly from the storefront because I 'd read somewhere that restaurants lose something like 40% of the price charged, to the delivery company uber eats, grub hub etc . As the prices were very fair given the generous portions, this means a re

One of the best chicken I had in my life! Super recommended! you can order from different delivery platforms.

Another great restaurant out of Jingletown Eats! Rad food options on the menu that are super different. The owner is really nice and threw in a sample of their special drink which was ginger, honey and an African fruit. I order the black cod steak... small portion but tasted great!

Ordered from their website, got the whole chicken, alloko, and fonio arrancini. Really juicy and delicious chicken, perfectly grilled. It goes really well with the sweet alloko (fried plantain) and spicy dip. The fonio arrancini are really delicious, crispy outside and cheesy, savory inside. Absolutely loved the whole experience! Will definitely come back!

The portions were way too small! I ordered the N'Zassa bowl with the black cod fillet and literally got a very small sliver of fish, like, I ate it in two bites. I was very excited about this order but was very disappointed. The meal was also very oily. For $13 I was hoping for more. As someone who has had food from the Ivory Coast before this was a big disappointment. The food did not taste bad, I just expected so much more. Definitely could have been better.