Local eatery serves decent workday fare

At Roadhouse Grill, starting at Sh300 a plate, you can get local Kenyan food like chapati, rice, ugali, plantain, beef stew, beans, vegetables and chicken. PHOTO | MADAME CONNOISSEUSE

What you need to know:

  • As usual, being that it was around lunchtime, the place was packed with people from offices in the area and it was hard to find a table on the outdoor terrace.
  • The place is exactly like I remembered it. The indoor sitting area, which is oddly always dimly lit regardless of the time of day, has the same plastic tables and chairs, the same television which is oddly always tuned into either the news or a football match, and I can almost swear that even the bartender is the same.

When I was a third year university student living in a servants quarter along Dennis Pritt Road and juggling school with my first job, which paid a miserable Sh35,000 a month, Roadhouse Grill which was right across the road, was the local joint I went to for cheap food.

One would think that any spot in this part of town would inherently be expensive but back then, I could get chips and kachumbari for Sh100, or if I was starting to look a little too porky from all that waru, I would spend Sh300 on ugali, a medium sized tilapia, sukuma wiki and kachumbari.

ROADHOUSE

Because I have since become a person who goes to spas, I left the one at Palacina Hotel and remembering that Roadhouse was just up the road, decided to stroll there more out of nostalgia than anything else. As usual, being that it was around lunchtime, the place was packed with people from offices in the area and it was hard to find a table on the outdoor terrace.

The place is exactly like I remembered it. The indoor sitting area, which is oddly always dimly lit regardless of the time of day, has the same plastic tables and chairs, the same television which is oddly always tuned into either the news or a football match, and I can almost swear that even the bartender is the same.

Simply put, whichever part of middle class Nairobi you happen to live in, this spot is exactly like your local which hardly ever seems to evolve, and that’s probably why you like it.

Outside there was smoke billowing in the nyama choma section complete with the ever teary eyed waiter, although the buffet spread was a welcome change.

PILED MY PLATE

There, starting at Sh300 a plate, you can get local Kenyan food like chapati, rice, ugali, plantain, beef stew, beans, vegetables and chicken. I piled up my plate with whatever looked good and the bill came to Sh300.

I wanted some greens and added a bit of sukuma wiki, and the chef surprisingly gave me another bill of Sh50. For that little sukuma wiki? I wanted to cry foul!

Still, isn’t it always interesting how you can walk into a 5-star restaurant and pay Sh4,000 for lunch without batting an eye because you knew what you were getting yourself into, but the moment an affordable place wants to charge you extra for something small, your nostrils start flaring? Or perhaps that just happens with Kenyan food... I know for a fact that that sukuma wiki costs Sh10, and yet if I went out and my Sh4,000 bill included a lemon meringue pie for dessert, I wouldn’t be doing much complaining because I wouldn’t have made it in my house anyway.

The food tastes alright. Perhaps the plight of dining off this buffet is that you can never give it glowing reviews because you will always secretly think that you can make it better yourself.