Places in Lagos| Orìlè Restaurant and Bar

Orìlè is a new restaurant in Lekki Phase 1, Lagos, that began operations in November 2020. I came across the restaurant on my Instagram feed during the holidays, and I planned to stop by. I couldn’t do this until last month, February 2021, with my friend, “A”.

In the Yoruba language, orìlè means head (of a house), so I guessed the restaurant would serve only Yoruba traditional dishes and I was excited and ready to explore.

AMBIENCE
Orìlè is a beautiful place. I fell in love with the wood and woven pieces of furniture that beamed all around the restaurant. As you can see from the pictures below, there’s a little bit of brown in everything. The restaurant has both outdoor and indoor seating arrangements on the ground floor. We were told the upper floor was still under construction. We decided to sit outside, scanned their menu, and it was time to get to the business of the day.

• 

• 

• 

MENU
There’s no bitting around the bush; the menu is super creative and inviting. With meal titles like Oko Oju Omi and Eko-Dun, I could tell somebody somewhere put some work into this to ensure it wasn’t a typical menu.

• 

• 

• 

WHAT WE ORDERED
We ordered the Chicken Lollipop and Ram rolls and puff puff for starters. For mains, I chose Eko-Dun while “A” chose Gabjumo from the grill. We were told our meals would take a maximum of 45 minutes to be ready because everything is made from scratch.

Our starters came first. I was a bit disappointed when I saw the ram rolls because I had no idea it would look like regular spring rolls with ram meat filling. The puff puff was a hit, and I ate most of it. On the other hand, the chicken lollipops were coated in an Akara (bean cake) tasting pastry. We didn’t love it.

When we were done with our starters, we still had to wait for about thirty minutes before our main meals came. I must admit I wasn’t hungry any longer, but my meal looked interesting when served, and I just had to try it.

The pasta had an exciting mix of flavours. I had never eaten creamy pasta with asun (spicy goat meat) before, so I didn’t have anything to compare it with. It tasted good, but I asked for it to be packed for me. “A” thought his grilled fish and jollof rice was bland, basic, tasteless, and not worth the price.

If we knew the puff puff would be the highlight of our dinner, we would have ordered two portions because every other thing we ate, wasn’t worth the price.

SERVICE DELIVERY & CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
Though the restaurant wasn’t busy, the wait time was insanely long. However, the waiters were very apologetic. The owner/manager came by to check in on us a couple of times and even offered meal suggestions. The restaurant observed all covid-19 safety protocols. We concluded that we didn’t have a satisfying experience at Orìlè.

DAMAGE
Water ~ 525
Soda water ~525
Ekodun ~ N6,000
Extra plantain ~ N1,000
Ram Roll & Puff ~ N4,500
Lollipop Chicken ~ N3,000
Grilled Tilapia, rice ~ N7,500
The restaurant adds 5% Consumption Tax and 7.5% VAT to all bills. Our total bill was N27,056.25

Out of 10, I rate Orìlè 5.

P.S. this is not a sponsored post. All opinions expressed were not influenced.

Mariam Shittu