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My favorite African restaurants in Paris

by Melle Bon Plan
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Today on the blog, I’m sharing a small selection of African restaurants in Paris. This is a collection of such restaurants that I’ve had the chance to try out in the capital. The Parisian spots I’m presenting below are quite different from one another. And as usual, I regularly update this article based on my new experiences and discoveries!

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This small restaurant located on Rue de Bagnolet in the 20th arrondissement has been around since 2018. You can enjoy West African cuisine there. The venue is housed in a beautiful, historically listed former butcher shop. We started with an assortment of appetizers (pastels, “aloco” plantain bananas, and fritters / €11) served with a nice, spicy sauce. Then, we tried a beef mafé with red rice (€14.90) and a chicken yassa with a lemon-onion sauce (€11.90). For dessert, we had a dégué thiakry (€5), a homemade yogurt with millet grains inside. As a drink, I recommend the homemade bissap juice (€3.50), the African drink par excellence!

Interior of the African restaurant Petit Bamako Paris, with decorated tables and a customer.
Tested in 2023

Au Petit Bamako

108 Rue de Bagnolet, 75020 Paris

Open Tuesday through Sunday

Price: between €5 and €5.50 / yassa dish between €10.90 and €16.90 / mafé dish between €11.90 and €13.90 (supplement of €1 for red rice) / desserts between €3.50 and €5

Link to the restaurant’s website

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Tested in 2020

Afrik’N’Fusion

54 Rue Jeanne d’Arc, 75013 Paris

Link to the restaurant’s Facebook page

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We tested the first branch of this chain in the 10th arrondissement of Paris in 2020, back when it was still called Afrik’N’Bowl (I had already mentioned it in my article about poke bowls). Today, it has changed its name. The restaurant offers healthy and gourmet African bowls. The idea behind the restaurant is also to showcase the nutritional qualities of African products, still little known in Europe (such as fonio, cassava, or millet couscous), and to break the stereotypes that African cuisine is always rich and not suitable for a healthy diet. On the menu: hot or cold bowls with 6 signature bowls already made, but also the possibility to create your own bowl by choosing every single ingredient!

Tested in 2020

Djaam Afro Food

187 rue du faubourg St Martin 75010 Paris

Link to the chain’s website

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It is rare to find a culinary concept with such great ambition in both the plate and the sharing of what is on that plate. I was more than curious to discover the Café Dapper, the restaurant from Chef Loïc Dablé, located within the Musée Dapper, a space unfortunately too little known, dedicated to the arts (traditional and contemporary) and the cultures of sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean, and their diasporas, secretly nestled just a stone’s throw from the Champs-Elysées.

What dialogue would emerge from this perspective between an art venue and a restaurant focused on African gastronomy? The result (in my opinion, of course), is a contemporary interpretation of gastronomy as a vector for understanding a culture. With this in mind, Loïc Dablé and his team gently introduce the curious, through codes that are understandable to us (re-visiting the risotto, the panna cotta), to the cuisine he calls afrofusion. He lets us taste dishes influenced by his African and French origins in a tasty and accessible marriage of cultures, with attentive work on seasonal products. If you add to that an impeccable welcome, a few semi-circular tables perfect for a moment of conviviality, and a more than palpable desire to share this cuisine, you get a confidential address that I can only recommend you go and discover.

Scallops and coral beans in an African sauce, a Café Dapper dish.

Must try:

  • A butternut squash soup with a wild African spice, Pébé.
  • A smoked chicken risotto with parsley-chili and chili foam (a sort of re-visitation of one of the most typical African dishes, rice with chicken).
  • Scallops with Niébé (an African white bean also called black-eyed peas or cowpeas).
  • A hibiscus panna cotta for dessert and a small coffee with quality chocolate pieces to finish the meal.

Another great plus is the possibility of tasting South African wines, which were a real, lovely discovery for me. I strongly recommend you try the experience!

Price:

  • The d’Art d’Arts menu served only at lunch for €29 with appetizer / main or main / dessert (the tip: €24 upon presentation of the ticket for the Dapper Museum)
  • The p’Art Âge brunch at €29 with a set menu (the tip: €24 upon presentation of the ticket for the Dapper Museum) on Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
  • The Sassandr’Art tasting menu at €45 (6 dishes) on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m.
Tested in 2015

Café Dapper Loïc Dablé
35 bis, rue Paul Valéry 75016 Paris

Update 01/14/2024: this restaurant unfortunately no longer exists, but you can still go visit the Dapper Foundation!



Find all my restaurant reviews in Paris below:
⇒ All my restaurant reviews in Paris

MAP OF MY FAVORITE FOOD SPOTS IN PARIS AND THE ILE-DE-FRANCE REGION

Orange location icon for the Chez Vous restaurant and cocktail barRestaurant Location icon for Chez Vous restaurant and cocktail barBar Location pin for Chez Vous restaurant and cocktail barPastry / Bakery Green location marker for Chez Vous, restaurant and cocktail bar.Tea Room / Coffee Shop
Location icon pointing to the address of the Chez Vous restaurant. Brunch Chez Vous restaurant location, map icon. Ice Cream Parlor


Photo credits: Nicolas Diolez and Mademoiselle Bon Plan
Photos are not royalty-free, photographer authorization mandatory before any use

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