Dish of the Week: Bukom Cafe’s Nkatenkwan

By: Elissa DeTellis | Culture Reporter

Find an aromatic and creamy stew to help sooth your end of semester nerves at Bukom Cafe, a long-established restaurant serving traditional West African cuisine. 

The restaurant’s name – which comes from Bukom Square, the lively and vibrant city center of Accra, Ghana – is an apt one given its location on bustling 18th Street in Adams Morgan. While the restaurant industry is known for its low survival rates, Bukom Cafe is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year, which speaks volumes about the food that they are creating, and D.C. 's demand for traditional West African cuisine.

Bukom Cafe’s storefront is simple but colorful with bright yellow signage above the restaurant and printed decals of the Ghanaian flag stuck to the windows. The restaurant is split level with plenty of seating at tables and the bar. The decorations varied from lovely patterned baskets hanging on the wall to a painting of a man soulfully playing the trumpet against the background of the cosmos. 

Inside you are greeted with a variety of background tunes including Afrobeats, Spanish music and reggae. Sadly I was not able to visit during one of the restaurant’s regular live performances that feature reggae, funk and soca, a music genre from Trinidad highly influenced by African and east Asian rhythms, artists that, after 10 p.m., are known to elicit dancing out of the patrons throughout the bi-level seating offerings.

With a full bar, Bukom Cafe’s cocktail menu boasts many intriguing options, including a variety of rum forward drinks that highlight tropical flavors like the mango lane ($8.18) which incorporates mango juice, rum, tequila, triple sec and grenadine. The bar has a selection of reds and white wine and several African beers to choose from. 

They also serve Malta, a nonalcoholic carbonated malted drink that tastes similar to beer from the Caribbean made from barley and hops. You can additionally opt for one of their speciality drinks such as their Africa Connection, a mix of Hennessy, Grand Marnier and fresh mango juice.

Given the recently dreary weather, I knew I wanted to try one of the stews, despite being tempted by the wings and rice option ($11.82). I decided to sample the nkatenkwan ($17), a West African stew made with ground peanuts as its base with tender chicken. 

The dish comes with your choice of fufu, pounded yam or white rice. I opted for the fufu, a starchy, slightly doughy staple of West African cooking that is typically made from mashed cassava, green plantains or yams. It doesn't have a strong taste, meaning it pairs well with bold stews. Because the texture is soft, fufu is traditionally swallowed without chewing. 

The dish came in a large bowl with a generous piece of fufu surrounded by the stew with substantially sized pieces of chicken still on the bone throughout the dish. As soon as the server brought the food I was struck with the pleasant smell of peanuts emanating from the slightly reddish, tomato based stew. 

I pinched off a piece of fufu and dipped it into the warm, comforting stew that came with a mixture of aromatics creating a bold and well-rounded flavor. The ground peanuts made the broth deliciously creamy, quite similar to the creaminess of a coconut milk based curry. As for the heat profile, the spice was delayed and developed in the back of my mouth, making me think that either Habaneros or Scotch Bonnet peppers, which are regularly used in Caribbean cuisines, were present in the dish.

Because the portion of chicken was considerable and fufu is known for being very filling, I left not only content, but with leftovers so I recommend coming with an appetite. 

Overall, the stew was a tasty and cozy meal that left me feeling satisfied and excited to return with friends. Head to Bukom Cafe to savor one of the District’s most well known West African restaurants and destress from the fear of finals with some relaxing reggae music while you’re at it.