The food platter and fries at Olivia’s Cafe
Olivia’s Café is located on one of the busier streets in Lekki Phase 1 and is one of the very few cafes in that area. There isn’t a lot of parking space for the café and the building in which it is located also houses a bakery so there’s a lot of coming and going which is why I was surprised to find the café itself relatively empty. I’m not a fan of crowded restaurants so the relative emptiness suited me just fine. I went there at lunch time on a week-day though so I can’t say if the place gets really busy in the evening.
Although I felt uncomfortable in the building when I first walked in because of all the people buying and paying for baked goods, once I got into the café itself, I felt better. Olivia’s is a light-filled room with an orange and white colour-scheme. A menu was brought to me immediately I sat down and for such a small place, they had quite a few things on their menu. The menu offered appetisers, pasta dishes, pizzas, chicken, steak, burgers, salads and a wide range of drinks from coffee to wine.
I ordered the platter which you customise by picking four items from the appetiser section of their menu. For my platter, I chose chicken satay, butterfly prawns, mini pizza and chicken wings. I also ordered French fries and a blueberry-peach smoothie with a yoghurt base although I was told the smoothie could have been made with ice-cream if I wanted. One thing worth mentioning is that there was no blueberry-peach smoothie on the menu. I originally asked for a strawberry-peach one but was told they were out of strawberries. I asked if a blueberry-peach one could be made for me instead and the waiter said yes so that made me happy. I got my drink soon after ordering and the food took 20 minutes to arrive which is pretty-much standard in Lagos. I’ve waited the better part of 45 minutes for food to arrive in some places.
The blueberry-peach smoothie at Olivia’s Cafe
Although they don’t look fantastic in the picture in this post, the chicken satay was the best thing on the platter to me. My least favourite were the chicken wings which were so hard I abandoned my cutlery to deal with them with my hands only to find that that didn’t help. I abandoned the wings in the end. The mini pizza was a little boring – just some sweetcorn, tomatoes and onions on top. The butterfly prawns were okay if a little burnt. The smoothie was great though. I ordered a second one.
In spite of my not really enjoying the meal, I liked the atmosphere of Olivia’s. I’ve been told they do a mean cappuccino though so maybe I’ll go back for that and try something else on the menu too.
Price: The platter cost N3,500, the French fries N500 and the smoothie N1,000.
Address: 33 Fola Osibo Street, Lekki Phase 1.
Read other restaurant reviews here.
Want to know when a new blog post of mine comes up? All you need to do is subscribe to my blog. It’s free! Just enter your email address into the box on the right. Want to get in touch with me? You can do so via Facebook or Twitter or by sending me an email. I’m on Instagram and Pinterest as well. Woo-hoo!
