Palatable Nigerian Cuisine

"My favorite Nigerian spot in Austin. I wish there were more locations, closer to downtown. Because they don’t have spots near me, I willingly drive 25 minutes on the highway to eat here. It is that good. And if you’re Nigerian, it feels like home cooking. The jollof is 10/10 but it’s palpable for foodies new to African food. I really appreciated how they packaged up my food and it all traveled well. I come here frequently and have made this restaurant part of my “rotation.”"

"I am typing this review while sitting on a toilet for the 5th time at 1:15am. While I’m mad, I’m still trying to be fair, hence the 2 stars. I am in Austin for a conference and I ate at palatable twice. The first time, I went in person and had amala, it was good, nothing remarkable but also no serious concerns. The meat was a little hard but I feel like that’s fairly common. My friend had jollof rice and the food came out cold and she talked about food safety with them not maintaining food at the proper temperature. That should have been a sign but I ignored it cuz I kept eyeing the egusi soup someone else at the restaurant was eating. Today is my last day in Austin and I decided to order egusi and poundo via Uber eats. If you scroll down, you’ll see other reviewers talked about how they felt cheated when they order online as opposed to going to eat in person. Comments like I was only given bones, or fewer pieces of meat, etc, so when I made my order I added a note asking for soft meats, no bones. I attached a picture of what came. The egusi had way more oil than soup. I saw multiple people eat egusi when I visited the restaurant and it wasn’t this oily. I had to pour out the oil to be able to eat this soup but it wasn’t very good cuz it just tasted very much like unbleached palm oil. Still I finished it cuz I live in a city that doesn’t have a single Nigerian restaurant so this was my last chance. I had that meal around 8pm and I’ve been to the toilet 5 times since then. Palatable owners, y’all need to do better. I met the man and his wife who owns the restaurant and they seem like a nice couple but you need to do better and stop acting like this is Nigeria where you can get away with anything. How do you pack oil inside soup like this? And how clean is your kitchen and food handling staff? Are people washing their hands before handling food? I am honestly tempted to call the authorities to do an inspection of your facility cuz I’ve never had diarrhea this bad in my life. And this was my first meal today, so I’m sure I got food poisoning from you. People trying to visit here, do it at your own risk."

"Palatable banks on the fact that there isn’t much competition in the area. That is why they can arbitrarily price their subpar food with impunity. Many of us Nigerians are just making do with them because like I said, no competition. These people are unserious at best, unscrupulous at the worst. I placed an order for snails through Grubhub and was shocked silly to find only 2 snails in the order. 2 snails! That is $10 a piece. Snails are generally a delicacy, that is understood. But it is not a rare enough delicacy to cost $10 a piece. A pack of snails at the African market is $25! Palatable purposefully doesn't state the order quantity on the apps because if they did, literally no one would buy 2 snails for $20. So they are dishonest cheats. These aren’t even jumbo snails! 2 Regular or small sized snails for $20?? That is highway robbery. I’m truly fed up with this place and encourage others to not patronize them so that they can go out of business, and we can be rid of their nonsense. Their food isn’t good enough for this rubbish anyway."

"I have always wanted to try Nigerian food and finally tried at this restaurant. The food was great and I really enjoyed it. However, it would have been nice if some meat was ready (like goat). I wanted to really try goat egusi but the fish one was really good regardless! so tasty"