Oh, Ethiopian food, how we love you!

Probably our favorite restaurant in the world is a tiny hole-in-the-wall Ethiopian restaurant in Grand Rapids called Little Africa. It's owned and run by a gentleman by the name of Lou. He's soft-spoken and extremely friendly.

We first experienced Little Africa just before we graduated from college eight years ago, and we've returned just about every time we visited Grand Rapids. The place is seriously amazing. We've never had food anything like it, even at other Ethiopian restaurants.

First, there's the hot tea (pictured at the top). We swear, there's something in this tea, aside from the indecipherable assortment of spices. We think it's laced with crack. It's that addictive. Lou makes it himself, and he won't tell you what's in it.

Ethiopian food is colorful and extremely flavorful. Lou makes exclusively vegetarian fare, but some Ethiopian restaurants use meat, too. His food incorporates peas, potatoes, lentils, chick peas, carrots, grape leaves, tomatoes, and various grains. The food is eaten without utensils; instead, you scoop it up with injera, a dense, pancake-like bread made from teff flour. It's fermented in a similar manner to sourdough. The owner of the Blue Nile, an Ethiopian restaurant in Columbus, once told us that it's common for people to feed each other over a meal like this, because people who feed each other will never betray each other.


The best part about our most recent trip to Little Africa was introducing Will to Ethiopian food! For the most part, he liked what he tasted, although he clearly had his doubts at first.

But he soon dug in. The only thing he didn't like was something mildly spicy (we barely noticed the spice). But he seemed pretty ticked with it - his face got a bit red and he stood up in his high chair and squealed, but we gave him some water and he was just fine. And he kept going back for more food. We gave him a taste of the tea, too, and that seemed to be his favorite part.

Next step, teaching him about Indian food!