Ooh, baby, do you know what that's worth?

Tripadvisor still rates Heaven Restaurant as the number one in Rwanda, a statistic which Heaven proudly quotes on their website. Perhaps the casual diner would prefer to hear the views of the general public on Tripadvisor than what a smartarse with a blogspot account thinks, but just remember this: the general public like eating at McDonalds.

Do check out the Heaven website though - my partially exposed bumcrack still appears peeping slyly at you in a photograph on the Heaven homepage. What a glorious legacy.

Pleasingly, the menu has changed since my last visit, but my concentration span is low so I order the default burger which impressed me so much on my very first visit. I also got to taste a Turbo King beer, a dark beer with a Trappist vibe going on. At about 8% though, overconsumption might lead to errors of judgement.

An amuse bouche is normally the chef's excuse to show off a bit, but here we are presented with the same baby poo on chapathi chips as they were knocking out two years ago. Yawn. They still haven't listened about the Guacamole either. A squeeze of lime juice, an extra pinch of salt, and maybe a spot of chilli is all it takes folks.

The burger seems to have declined. Despite ordering medium, it comes well done, very dry, and about the size of a bottle top. The bun is also dry and slightly burnt, while the triangle of cheese is barely visible. Chez Lando do a better burger. Yes: Chez Lando. Chips (fries) are good though. Very crisp and more-ish.

Making fish and chips - proper British fresh-from-the-chippy fish and chips - is both a delicate science and a fine art. Either do it properly or don't do it at all. Likewise ravioli: it looks all handmade and nice, but why force it to swim in a big red puddle like some sort of bizarre alien crime scene?

So, top marks for chips (fries) and very good service. Top marks for that view as well. I had a quick poke around in the kitchen too, which seemed very clean, until I was politely ejected. I can't quite put my finger on why Heaven always strikes me as a bit weird though. It's a bit like going on the London Eye. You can enjoy the view, especially at night, but it's expensive, and you're in a bubble isolated from the people in the city down below, surrounded by overweight tourists.

Number 1? Nope, maybe top five on a good day.

It's okay, even better this way. That's what they'll tell you. That's what they'll say

Just down the Hill from Mille Collines - in what I think used to be the American club - the Royal Garden is knocking out a mix of Chinese and Indian food, and minestrone soup.

The main thrust of the menu is the sort of vaguely Indian cuisine served at Khazana, although with the addition a whole page of ever reliable egg curries on the menu.

A few years back there used to be an Indian Restaurant in Kigali called the Minar, and I wonder if the chef at Royal Garden used to work there. Like the Minar, Royal Garden's curries are quite rich and creamy, and very heavy on the ghee. Fresh herbs are in evidence, but these fail to make much an impression against the heavy sauces.

Tandoori roti's are OK, a little over-cooked around the edges, and rices fine. Our paneer sizzler is delayed, and arrives only after one of our table ("the Atilla the Hun of restaurant feedback") wrestles a waiter to the ground and sets about him with a tightly rolled chapathi. What arrives is kind of weird, and involves cabbage, chicken, and cheese.

But lo - the manager takes it off the bill, and demands feedback. OK then, here is my feedback:
Lighten up the food and tighten up the service. Skim off some of that ghee and have more faith in your spices and fresh herbs. Keep the breads moving quick in the tandoori - they need to come straight to the table before they start cooling and going hard. Tighten up on service - it is very friendly and polite but the wait on the sizzler dish was a bit silly.
And take the tinned soups off the menu.

It is Valentine's night, and the place is packed with people wearing red. Our table are the only wazungu present, so it is sort of the inverse of Khazana in that respect. I reckon that could be a very good thing indeed. Once the restaurant settles in a bit, I'd say the food might easily match up to Khazana (and no Khazana-style "morning after" problems were reported). So Royal Garden: good luck.

Royal Garden
Kiyovu, Opposite the Bank National of Rwanda
Tel:0788 500073
Email: gardenroyal@yahoo.com

I go, I come back.

I'm back. My usual table please.

Despite an absence of 18 months or so, the staff at Chez Lando greet me like an old friend. Some things have changed for the better - there are more hotel rooms and fewer tarts in the bar than previously - and some things have taken a turn for the worse. The best bar in Kigali, Jiffling HQ, is now a building site, and we're forced to take our Mutzigs around the corner were the old nightclub used to be. At least you can get a croque-monsieur now (well, a loose interpretation of one). All my lobbying finally paid off.

I see Ndoli's still sells Domaine Bergon for 8000 RwF, and that the hot snacks still make you ill. Sole Luna seems bigger, or maybe I just got smaller, and the young digital nomads still play the game of eyes with each other from behind their laptops at the Bourbon Cafe. Is it me, or is Bourbon Cafe getting a little scruffy?

Anyhow, recommendations please folks. Don't be shy.

Getting out of town

Its been a little while, and material has dried up somewhat. In the New Year I'll update the Kigali 'long list' of reviews and sort them into restaurant types for easy surfing action.

For now though, lets have a look further afield. Some gorilla hunting types may end up spending the night in Ruhengeri on their way to visit our hairy cousins in Volcanoes National Park. With this in mind, here are a few reviews from Ruhengeri.

Having spent the best part of three months based in Ruhengeri, I'd recommend visitors avoid some of the more down at heel bars. As well as the usual annoyingly drunk 'friends' that strangers seem to accumulate in such places, I witnessed a fair few angry punch-ups. My interest in the grotty bars of the world remains strong, but it's important to know when it's time to leave.

Tourist Rest House, Rue Muhabura
Despite the general air of grubbiness and foot dragging service, this place remains my favourite place to eat in Ruhengeri. The Ugandan manager speaks good English and is eager to please. The menu is reasonably varied and its a good place to meet friendly folk from Ruhengeri who are having a quiet drink, as well as overlanders and backpackers.

Recommended:

• Cheap, and reasonably varied menu. Very good chappathis.
• Friendly and calm atmosphere.

Avoid:

• When the power goes off the mice come out to play.

Hotel Urumuri, Rue du Marche
Hard to work out what is going on here, it seems a bit disorganised. Most things on the menu are off, but brochettes are almost guaranteed. You may have to wait some time while they go out and buy the meat though.

Recommended:

• Cheap

Avoid:

• Boring food
• A bit disorganised - you'll have a long wait

Silverback Bar and Restaurant, Avenue du 5 Juillet (website)
This is a great spot for lunch as you can watch the world go by on Ruhengeri 'High Street'. Food is good quality - the usual brochettes etc, but with a few sandwiches and salads thrown in as well as a lunchtime buffet. There is a decent disco here, and a modern hotel. Its also a good spot for keeping an eye on bus arrivals and departures.

Recommended:

• For people watching
• Good, clean environment

Avoid:

• Can get busy at lunchtime

Home d'Accueil, Avenue du 5 Juillet
Offers up a single massive plate of food at lunchtime, usually beef of some description, with all the carbs and beans you can eat. A little flirtation brings out the best in the staff and it's a pleasant place to spend lunchtime. Some senior military personnel like to eat lunch here, so everyone is well behaved.

Recommended:

• Cheap with massive portions
• Quick service at lunchtime

Avoid:

• Little choice available

Hotel Muhabura, Avenue du 5 Juillet
Supposedly the only 'decent' hotel in Ruhengeri, this place suffers from the blight of many Rwandese hotels - they are happy to bump guests out of their rooms if a better offer comes in. The food is no better than Silverback, but the prices are higher. You might meet NGO types here.

Recommended:

• Not a bad place for a drink
• The food is OK

Avoid:

• Overpriced
• Bad service
• Awful, awful coffee.

Some other tips on Ruhengeri that the guidebook neglects to tell you:

If you've just returned from Gorilla trekking and are eager to email your friends and family about your amazing experience, please take your muddy boots off before you go into the internet cafes. The owners are too polite to say anything, but they get very annoyed with the daily gang of dirty foreigners trailing mud onto their premises. Your courtesy will be acknowledged with kind smiles.

If you're travelling by bus keep a little spare change for the people who gather to beg around the bus stations. These people are not opportunists like you might occasionally find in Kigali, but are often people with mental health problems or who are very physically ill.

Don't walk on the grass in the middle of the main road through Ruhengeri, cross only where indicated.

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I'll post a guide to Gisenyi soon. Butare, being a university town has a few exciting places to eat - I've had some worthwhile stops there. I'm not that familiar with the town though, so ideas welcome.

Counting the statistics

I've got this little bit of software that monitors how many visitors there are to my blogs. I doesn't steal your data or anything like that, just tells me when, how many, and where you come from, both in terms of links and search terms, and your actual physical geography.

Yawn. Most interesting is a little function that tells you the search terms entered into a search engine which then prompted the user to click through to Kigali Restaurant Reviews. There are a few popular searches, most disturbingly people (mainly residing in Switzerland and Belgium, it seems) searching for the promise of pay-as-you-go sex at some of the more popular hotels in Kigali. My warning remarks about a few places also work as a useful guide for the travelling scumbag.

Apart from all that, another popular, and altogether more legitimate search is for 'Heaven Restaurant'. It seems that the folks at Heaven have their own website now: Heaven Restaurant Website

It looks like they're doing a US election night special on the 4th November, so get down there and order some Obama burgers.

Also doing good trade at the moment are Torero in town. If they get that place right then Kigali may have a cultural hub worth talking about. Good Luck to them. They have a website too: Torero Cafe Website

Kigali: A 24 Hour City

Kigali is not so much a city that never sleeps, as, as Alex Turner might put it, a city that never wakes up. What qualifies it as a 24 hour city, is that a lot of visitors only end up spending 24 hours there. As a veteran of Kigali hotels I can confirm that the travelling aid dealers, overlanders, and gorilla hunters tend to make their stops in Kigali as short as possible, before venturing on to excitement elsewhere.

So, in the absence of any real new material (or content, as I believe the kids call it these days), here's a cut out and keep guide to where to eat if you're in Kigali for 24 hours.

High End
Are you a luxury gorilla tourist, or a high rolling World Bank aid monkey? Here's how to spend those dollars:

Breakfast:
The buffet at Serena is hard to beat, but if you're not staying there it will set you back at least $20. Otherwise try the Panorama Restaurant at the top of the Hotel Mille Collins. The buffet isn't as spectacular, but the view makes a great start to the day.

Lunch / Snacks:
The Novotel buffet is one of those places to go when you have money to burn. It isn't much fun though. Better is the Bourbon Cafe, with branches at the Union Trade Centre in town, and the MTN Centre in Nyarutarama. Excellent coffees come with free wi-fi, leather sofas, and an international menu (i.e. club sandwiches, salads and burgers)

Dinner (or 'tea' if you're from my neck of the woods)
Its a choice between Indian Khazana, for curry and fancy dress waiters, or Heaven for a quality, local sourced menu that changes with the seasons. Both restaurants are in Kiyovu and will set you back a minimum of $20 a head - more if you order wine.

Late night drinking:
Head down to Republika in Kiyovu for cocktails and beers with a view across the valley.


Mid-range
For the NGO workers, journalists and solo travellers looking for a hassle free bite.

Breakfast:
At the hotel, or why not stop in and pick up a pain au chocolat from the bakery at the Novotel or the Nakumatt at UTC.

Lunch:
La Sierra, near the banks in town does sandwiches, samosas, cheese pasties and a buffet. Eden garden a few doors down has a well regarded buffet. $10 will buy a decent Italian buffet at the Sol e Luna in Remera.

Dinner:
Back to Sol e Luna for a choice of about 50 pizzas, decent pasta and pitchers of red wine. For a broader menu, head to New Cactus in Kiyovu. A reasonably priced and very tasty buffet can be found at Chez Robert, across the road from the Hotel Mille Collines.

Late night drinking:
Fine dine or Karibu in town for a few beers, then on to Planete nightclub for a dance.

Budget:
Overlanders, backpackers, volunteers, save your pennies for the following.

Breakfast:
A cup of tea and a few biscuits. Who needs breakfast?

Lunch:
There are good buffets to be had at the Kigali Business Centre, Le Banjo in Remera, and at Nile Grill (Rue Kalisimbi, city centre)

Dinner:
Load up on meat quite cheaply at Carwash in Kimihurura, or grab a buffet at Karibu. Chez Lando's (Remera) brochettes come pretty cheap.

After hours drinking:
Stay at Carwash, or Chez Lando, or head over to Fine dine. New Cadillac for dancing.

Nakumatt

All hail the arrival of Nakumatt in Kigali.

For the uninitiated, Nakumatt is a successful Kenyan supermarket, that has recently opened itsfirst branch outside Kenya in the Union Trade Centre, smack in the middle of what passes for Kigali 'city centre'. They plan more openings around town soon. Rejoice.

Readers of Experimental Jifflings, or anyone who has shared a beer with me, may detect a whiff of hypocrisy here. I've been in the checkout queue to give the big supermarkets a kicking in the past, and I'll continue beat my little drum in future. But Nakumatt is a different case.

For one thing, it's Kenyan owned, starting out in Nakuru as a little store selling mattresses (hence the name Nakumatt). I'm pleased to see that the store in Kigali still sells mattresses. The real Nakumatt boom has only come in the last ten years, and they train and pay their employees well, and are an example of how East African business can do well in East Africa. Over in Dakar we have to make do with a grim monopoly of the French owned Casino supermarket chain.

Why is this good for Kigali? Well it's a firm kick up the backside to all the other supermarket owners who overcharge, underservice, and can't guarantee supplies. Nakumatt's economies of scale will bring a new diversity of products to the shelves, and will ensure keen prices. With any luck, Nakumatt's influence will overturn the poor service and silly prices that seem to be the accepted norm at most shops and restaurants in Kigali. Thats no excuse for the City Council to let them open a store on every corner (not that the City Council would ever, ever be open to any sort of persuasion), but a bit of exposure to an economy outside of the bubble is long overdue, and should sharpen everybody up.

And thank Nakumatt for one last thing: Those 8000 franc bottles of Domaine Bergon will be a thing of the past. Now we're entering a new era of Spanish and South african plonks in all the colours that go for less than 5 notes a bottle.

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In 1998 I rolled a trolley around a Nakumatt in Nairobi for the first time. We were there to fill up on supplies for 3 months of fieldwork under canvas, and it was an ideal one stop shop. I'd just come from Norfolk, UK, were I'd spent much of my time tramping around the Broads practicing my field skills. Roys of Wroxham (a supermarket hero) had provided me lunchtime sustenance on many a grey winter morning, so I was delighted to discover that my Nakumatt trolley proudly advertised 'Roys of Wroxham' on the handle. How the hell does one get a shopping trolley from East Anglia to Nairobi? That is one hell of a steal.