Carnivores in Nariobi, Kenya

I had to blog about this place.

When I was looking for some animals in Africa, I had the opportunity to go to a restaurant called carnivores. It specialised in a large selection of meat and was all you can eat! This restaurant was a winner and I hadn’t even been to it yet.

Walking into this dining heaven I am confronted by an animal on a spit. I am used to the odd pig on a spit, but this was something else. They had stuck a whole cow on a spit! The kitchen area was ridiculous. Meat was dangling everywhere like some sort of glorious decoration, there were massive skewers of meat cooking everywhere. It was a bbq on steroids. The setting was incredible, I felt like Hansel in a meat version of a gingerbread house. Isn’t that a terrible story, you have a dysfunctional family that dumps their children in the woods, the equivalent of a dumpster, they are then found by a cannibalistic witch, who is then outwitted and burnt in her own fire! What kind of story is that for young children! Anyway…

Once seated at the table we are told that we are allowed to eat as much meat as we want of and when you are finished you put the flag at your end of the table up. Like some sort of surrender flag. Really though after seeing the beast at the front door, there was no winning here, unless you were a human sized shrew.

Our first dish surprisingly wasn’t meat, it was soup and bread. Just a dish to warm us up, but not what we were here for. A massive debate raged between by logical brain who wanted to preserve precious stomach space and my illogical stomach who had a 3am Saturday night persona and just wanted a feed. The stomach won.

Then it came. The meat. The waiters brought round massive skewers of meat which they would carve onto your plate. It was entertaining and absolutely glorious. We were served a massive array of meat all prepared in different ways and all with a complimentary sauce – chicken (garlic), pork (fruit salsa), ostrich (wildberry), turkey (wildberry), crocodile (garlic), gizzard (garlic) , lamb (mint), ox balls (garlic) and good old beef (tikka masala) and liver (garlic) from some animal. Tikka malasa was the best, that sauce went with everything. For those who like to have a ‘complete’ meal, there was a selection of salads beneath the sauces. But like Christmas time at home where meat predominates they were not going to make an appearance on my plate today. The place was called carnivores not omnivores.

The variety was impressive and made for an interesting afternoon of eating. First we got to try a bit of everything. Can’t say I was a fan of the crocodile- that tasted like chicken and a fish’s offspring. I had never tried ostrich before and I must say I was impressed, they came in the form of meatballs which is always fun and had a rich beefy taste balanced by the wildberry sauce that accompanied it. Gizzard-not even sure what the fuck that is, and its taste and texture only added to the mystery. It had a rubbery consistency like you find with squid or calamari and were really chewy, with a subtle liver like taste to them, very weird. At these kind of events you gotta eat some balls, and these ones I didn’t enjoy at all, they had a texture that reminded of pate and I swear they would taste like chicken if you didn’t know you were eating balls.

My favourite was actually the turkey. They carve us off large beautiful slices of the stuff and it was cooked to a glorious white perfection.

After trying everything, the next part of the meal is about survival. I was determined to not only to make my money’s worth, but to be the last one standing. The waiters were determined to see me surrender early, with each successive serving being larger than the last. The meat was always scrumptious, but after a while I started to despise the look of it. I think it was a defensive mechanism from my stomach. One dude went to far and put a large potato on my plate! Apparently the winner of the table had to finish the meal with a whole spud. For me that was like drinking the tequila last in a slammer, but instead of drinking it, sucking it through your nose.

After a like 7 rounds of meat servings there was only two of use left, Logan and me. I wasn’t in a good state. I was sweating, becoming nauseated and trembling. It was like meat fever. It was dire. I tried massaging meat out of my stomach like a tube of toothpaste but my small bowel objected loudly, seems like the lanky bugger was working overtime. I had honestly eaten enough meat to satisfy a male lion with some leftover to feed the rest of the pride.

After what seemed like a lifetime I gave in to the relentless waiters. I gave the victory away sadly to Logan a deserving winner. That was not before I ate the spud. Now that was a battle. I don’t even think finishing a marathon could compete with that harrowing experience. I went through all that for nothing really, just a painful stomach worthy of a surgical consult and stools the next day that could block a pipeline from shell.

Somehow in all of this I ate desert. It always seems that you have room for that course. It just squeezes itself in like a Mongolian contortionist.

I managed to walk out of this place, but it wasn’t pretty. I couldn’t straighten up so I looked like a old man, or a pregnant woman with a ‘food baby’ as one of my tour mates cleverly described. Proper exit though, I wasn’t there to fuck spiders.

So if you are in Kenya at anytime I would highly recommend this restaurant. Even if you are a vegetarian because the delicious meat might make you change your mind for the better. They focus on one thing and they execute it well.

Rating

setting-5/5 (in africa and a big as cow on the spit, cant compete really)

Taste-5/6 meat always tastes good

presentation- 5/5

service- 4/5-They carve you your meat! couple of drink orders went astray though.

total-18.5/21

I do love meat so this rating may have some bias.

cheers

Larry