Masala Wahala — Restaurant in Central Business District

I went to Ceddi Plaza to see Sing 2 (which was great btw) after which I decided to have lunch at Nkoyo. Before we went to Nkoyo, we checked the google reviews and overall, it was good (in fact, they mostly had five stars). When we got to Nkoyo, we ordered from Masala Wahala menu.

Unfortunately, my experience was not five star at all (it was a little less than 3 stars). When my friend and I got there, a waiter came to attend to us. He gave us a menu to decide what we wanted to order and while we were looking through, this guy excused himself “briefly” and stepped away. We waited for a little over 10 minutes (cos we had some questions) and this guy was nowhere to be seen. We called for another waiter and asked him some questions. He wasn’t sure about somethings so he went to the kitchen to “confirm”. 15 minutes later (again), this guy is nowhere to be seen (lol second waiter that’s ghosting us). By now, I was already getting frustrated. We called another waiter who took our order quickly and confirmed it for us (we didn’t ask this guy questions before he ghosts us 😑).

The wait time was not so long; it was between 20 minutes to 30 minutes. While we were waiting, we were given potato chips to munch (loved this).

Finally, our order came. We ordered the Lamb Biryani (5500), Chicken Vartha Curry with steamed rice (4500), Kerala Paratha (which is flaky wheat bread) - 1000. I loved the Kerala Paratha so much. It looked like pancake but it was very much lighter, it was scattered (a bit) and had a (different) better flavor. I didn’t like any of the other things that we order 🥲. The steamed rice was too dry (and hard), the chicken vartha curry was like a bad version of chicken tikka masala, and the lamb biryani was weird; the lamb was tender but not as tender as I expected. The taste of the Lamb Biryani was confusing tbh (I didn’t like it).

Overall, the ambience is nice. I think I made a mistake in what I ordered. I should have just ordered Nigerian dishes and left the Masala Wahala menu. Anyways I will revisit for that Kerala...

I'd say the food was somewhat good. I had Edika-Ikong, though it didn't quite come out looking like real edika ikong buy tastewise, id give it 80%. A friend that I went with ordered for bitterleaf soup and the soup came out looking more like Nsala soup with the leaves very scantily seen.

Also, I had orange juice and my friend had watermelon juice. Those were 100% juices.

As for the service, you can get forgotten if you don't put in some effort to call for your food but most importantly, your bill.

For the atmosphere, a section of the restaurant, where we wanted to sit in, was enveloped by uncomfortable smoke, which they attributed to their grilling, and so we had to move to a slightly better area. Other than the smoke problem, the restaurant is beautiful with relaxing decors and the toilet is CLEAN! I'm very particular about restaurants' toilets, which should...

I had the soggiest and tasteless biryani ever. I won't be going back for any Indian food. We went as a group on the 22nd December 2021, some ordered pounded yam and egusi/seafood okra which I tasted and didn't find too impressive but they liked it. Many of us ordered biryani, it was very badly made, even the meat was tasteless. Seems it was hurriedly put together and carelessly made. I was pained because we paid a lot of money and we had better choices of Indian restaurants in abuja but one of us insisted that Nkoyo was the best so we went but she also regretted the choice. Pls if you are looking for Indian cuisine, this is not the place in Abuja I bet you. The waiter was great, friendly, patient...