You’re Ghana Love Drelyse African Restaurant
Drelyse’s African Restaurant is a small restaurant with big flavors.
“I get all my spices from the continent,” said Lyse Bannerman, the owner and chef at Drelyse and a native of Ghana.
Bannerman laid out a feast of spiced beef and lamb, hot and savory Jollof rice with Chimmichuri, sambusas with spicy sauce and an Instagram-worthy Fufu – a starchy dumpling eaten with stew.
The chef said she pulls cuisine from across Africa to populate her menu. She serves Ghanaian fare, and samples dishes from Sierra Leone, Nigeria and other countries. African hiphop artists like Ghana’s Sarkodie play on the stereo.
I thought I recognized in the food a flare for presentation learned from chef training, and sure enough, Bannerman has her culinary certificate earned in Columbus posted on the restaurant wall.
She started the meal with suyu brisket-and-onion appetizer bites seasoned with African spices and peanut powder.
Bannerman also nearly dragged me into the ongoing Jollof Wars between Ghana and Nigeria — see the video.
Traveling to Africa via Northland
I knew when I started The SkilletReport I wanted to really dive into the African food scene here in Columbus – home to one of the largest concentrations of African immigrants in the U.S. according to conversations I had with a spokesperson at Experience Columbus.
I knew little about African food, and I did no research ahead of time – I found out as a reporter, it’s always best to learn directly from the people who make or do what you’re writing about then fill in details later with internet research.
I did only a few basic Google searches, and Drelyse’s African Food in Northland south of Route 161 was one of the top results with excellent Yelp and Google reviews.
Getting Drunk, Straight from the Tree
I started off with palm wine – the tongue-twisting Nkulenu’s Palm Drink. It was creamy and delicious in a way other palm wine I’ve tasted from Asia isn’t. You have to shake it up to disperse the sediment at the bottom. Then, you pour it in a Calabash gourd cup and perch it on a wooden tripod between drinks.
The Ghanaian Nkulenu brand also makes palm soup base, a creamy staple in African households. Bannerman told me Nkulenu still uses traditional methods in which the Palm wine ferments while it’s still in the tree. You can drink it straight out of the tap complete with alcohol (about 4.5 %), and it’s useful – topically – for easing chicken pox rashes.
Dude, Don’t Chew the Fufu
Bannerman served a perfect, bouncy, stretchy mound of white dough called a fufu, a classic African dish made of cassava, yams or other starches boiled and pounded.
Drelyse African Food served the fufu with a spicy goat stew. The fufu’s flavor is mild and pleasant, especially with the savory tomato broth in the stew.
Your wait staff brings you a basin and soap for your hands, and then you pull small bites of dough from the fufu, dipping them into the stew before swallowing.
There’s a trick to pulling perfect-sized bites to swallow, and I have not mastered it yet. I also chewed my first bite, which makes things difficult.
The fufu-making process is an internet phenomenon, worldwide.
The Holy Trinity of African Cuisine: Onions, Peanuts, Chilies
The lamb chops and Jollof rice has a deep and complex flavor – Jollof is the base of many African dishes and reminds me a little bit of jambalaya. It makes sense that Southern food has an African influence.
The fried African sweet potatoes were also different than other sweet potatoes I’ve tasted – sweeter and creamier in texture.
Overall, the heat and chili spice was familiar to me, as was the use of peanuts (I love Thai food, and they use a ton). But the savory spice flavors common to many of the dishes had a foundation in bay and paprika that gave the flavor an Old-World depth you don’t find in spicy Mexican or Asian food.
I found it completely unique and quite delicious, which is the whole point of starting this blog.
Drelyse’s is a small place in a strip mall on Tamarack Circle in Northland. It’s poised for renovation after an accident shattered one of its front windows. The cozy dining room is still open, though, and hosts a steady stream of takeout customers. Drelyse is also growing its catering business.
As renovations get underway, Bannerman is planning a program of summer parties centered on the grill she installed in her back patio during the pandemic.
“Come here in the summer,” she told me. “You’ll have the hottest report on social media!”
I will, Lyse. I’ll come hungry, too.
Tips if You Go TO DRELYSE
If you have a peanut allergy, let Drelyse staff know as soon as you arrive. They don’t use peanut oil for frying, and they are well-versed in accommodating folks with peanut allergies, even though peanuts feature heavily in their dishes.
I like my steak “medium” at a steakhouse, but the beef and lamb at Drelyse and other African restaurants are well-done according to tradition. African chefs carefully spice and sauce the dishes with the intention of cooking the meat well-done, and I really enjoyed it. But if you insist on rare steaks and chops, you should order off the fish menu instead.
Many African cultures where Bannerman draws inspiration use their hands to eat. If you are not experienced in this, please use silverware. If you don’t know the right table manners, jamming fistfulls of jollof into your face can be hard for fellow patrons to watch. And it will likely make the cooks sad.
