Travel Like Bourdain
Ghana
Bourdain said Accra made him rethink everything he thought he knew about food.
The Forgotten Atlas — Field Report
Bourdain said Accra made him rethink everything he thought he knew about food.
Anthony Bourdain came to Accra and said it made him rethink everything he thought he knew about food. That is not a sentence he threw around. Coming from a man who had eaten in over a hundred countries, in everything from Michelin-starred restaurants to roadside stalls in the middle of nowhere, that is an extraordinary statement. Ghanaian cuisine is one of the great cuisines of the world and almost no one outside West Africa knows it. That is changing. Slowly. Go now before the secret is completely out.
Ghana changed everything I thought I understood about African food. I was humbled and astonished in equal measure.
Anthony Bourdain
The anchors of Ghanaian cooking are palm nut soup, groundnut soup, fufu — the starchy dough made from cassava and plantain that you pull apart with your fingers and dip into richly spiced broths — and jollof rice, the dish that Ghana and Nigeria have been arguing about for decades (Ghana is right). The spicing is complex without being aggressive. The soups have depth that comes from hours of cooking and the layering of dried fish, smoked ingredients, and aromatics that have no equivalent in any other cuisine.
Accra is a city of extremes and contradictions in the best way. The Labadi beach scene is the Africa of parties and music and young people who are completely connected to the world. The National Museum tells a history that most visitors have never learned. The slave forts an hour outside the city along the Cape Coast — Elmina and Cape Coast Castle — are among the most powerful and important historical sites in the world. You cannot understand Ghana without going to them.
Stay in Osu or Labone. Eat in La or Jamestown. Listen to highlife music at night. Come back with more time.
The expatriate and restaurant hub. Oxford Street runs through it. The best starting point for visitors even if the most interesting eating is elsewhere.
The old colonial quarter and fishing community. The most atmospheric neighbourhood in the city. The boxing gym here has produced multiple world champions.
A neighbourhood that tourists almost never reach. The local chop bars here serve the most authentic Ghanaian food you will find in the city.
West African food served in a beautiful space in Osu. The palm nut soup and the jollof rice here are the benchmark. Start here.
Ethiopian food in Accra that has developed its own Ghanaian inflection. Remarkable injera and the most interesting fusion of two great African food traditions.
Local grilled meat, cold Star beer, and a view over the beach. Simple and perfect.
Find any chop bar in La serving fufu and palm nut soup on a weekend afternoon. Eat with your hands. This is the real thing.
Japanese-Ghanaian fusion that should not work and is one of the most interesting restaurants in West Africa. Chef Selassie Atadika is extraordinary.
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