Zweli's — Restaurant in Durham

My wife and I love going to restaurants, especially ones that are non-traditional. Bonus points if they are Black-owned as I am African-American and my wife is Caribbean. That said, we decided to give Zweli's a try last week (October 13, 2022). I will give the GOOD, the BAD and the UGLY below.

THE GOOD: Even though I made reservations in advance, upon arrival we saw that there was no wait for tables, so we were seated right away and had our choice of seats as the restaurant was pretty empty (maybe that's bad, lol) The Samosas were very appealing, I highly recommend those if you decide to go there The specialty Homemade Lemonade was DELIGHTFUL --on that night we were offered the Blueberry Lemonade flavor and we found it so delicious we both ordered 2 rounds

THE BAD: Our Waitress was very rude and kept rushing to take items off our table --sometimes while we were still consuming them! Long wait times for food when --again-- the restaurant was not crowded at all Waitress did a poor job of checking to see if we needed anything --that is AFTER finally getting her attention (she was about to sit down when I had to vigorously wave my hands across the room to get her attention) Our entrees were VERY POORLY SEASONED. I had the Oxtails, my wife had the Dovi Tofu and we shared an order of wings...all of which extremely lacked flavor for such an "ethnic" spot. The Oxtails were very large --meaning it was taken from the part of the cow closest to the butt, which is not as tender-- the Jollof Rice was not edible and the Dovi Collards had too much peanut sauce for my liking (my wife has no complaints about her collards though, fwiw)

THE UGLY: While waiting (an extremely long amount of time) to get our bill so I could pay, we noticed the Owner of the establishment walk in --the "Pop" of their "Mom & Pop" establishment. He did not walk over to our table to greet us nor ask how the food/service was at his restaurant. You would think since we were one of the very few patrons that evening --spending a lot of our hard-earned money in the community, mind you-- he would've been more supportive. No worries, they will never get another dime from...

Two words: Simply AMAZING!

I was so excited to visit this place after a friend shared a news article about it. There are so few African restaurants in the RDU area that I had to come this weekend to try it.

My boyfriend and I walked in and were instantly greeted by a member of the serving staff, and the co-owner, Leonardo. The decor of the place is breath-taking. We could tell the owners took the time and energy to make the space beautiful. We researched the menu before we arrived (a few days prior haha) so we had an idea of what we wanted. Tarzan(our server) answered any and all questions we had about the menu before we ordered.

I ordered the Peri Peri wings with veggie yellow rice pilaf and curry cabbage. My boyfriend ordered the black bean burger with Chakalaka and collard greens.

Leonardo talked to us for a little bit while we waited for the food. He was so nice and welcoming. I felt at home at the restaurant ☺️. He even told us the backstory of his wife, Chef Zweli, and how her childhood influenced the menu.

So, the food came out and Y’ALL...it smelled good, looked good, and you bet, tasted good! My wings were seasoned perfectly! I usually ask for some type of sauce or hot sauce to accompany my wings but I didn’t need any, at all. The rice had such flavor and the cabbage did too. My bf’s food was awesome too, he reported. He inhaled his black bean burger which came with Peri Peri chips. His favorite parts of the meal were the collard greens and Chakalaka. I’ve never tasted anything like that! It was so tasty, especially the collards which had peanut butter and spices in it.

We ate every bite of our meals and ordered our favorite sides to-go🤗. Oh, did I mention, it’s affordable? I was comfortablely full at such reasonable prices, I couldn’t believe it.

Once the word gets out around town, this place is going to have lines out the door...especially when college/university students come back for the Fall.

I will be back soon with family and friends so they can also experience this restaurant! I can’t wait to see Chef Zweli’s and Leonardo’s big plans for this...

My second visit was last night. It was extremely different from my first visit. My first visit had nice to go plastic sealing containers. My wife was even treated to a sampler by one of the cooks. My second visit was also to go, but I went by myself. The visit had me with a styrofoam box that was torn, with somebody's else name written on it with a pen...it was written in hard like a stencil almost. Also the box had taped plastic on the other writing that said what that person had ordered. They tried to tape that away from me, but I just pulled it up and read. My fried butternut squash fries fell through the bag because they had no wrap whatsoever. They just threw hot fries in a paper bag and expected nothing to happen. I was missing my sauce for those fries. So I ask for it. I was told that they are out of it. I then ask for compensation for no sauce. I was told that they don't do compensation. I told cashier to talk again to management, mysteriously he came back with a sauce saying that it had just been made. But when he put in my hand, it was refrigerator cold. So it wasn't just made. The only thing that was wrapped proper was my rice...in a covered bowl. Last thing, he told me 22 at first, but when he came back with the oh we are out of sauce, he told me 28. I reminded him that he said 22, but he said that he said 28. Now I read another review on here about an automatic tip, I will check my receipt closer. I will speak with management tmrw, as they had alot of clients around and I didn't want to make a fuss on the spot. But I saved the box and paper bag to talk with them tomorrow as they are closed today. The food was good, but I want let the lying, equipment malfunction, and bad presentation slide. There might be too many people running around in this kitchen and management is not fully managing employees correctly. I was not happy about how I was...