What to eat in Stone Town
Grilled fish at Forodhani, clove-scented pilau in a local place and urojo for lunch — Zanzibar cooking is Indian, Arab and African in the same plate.
- Lunch
- Urojo
- Dinner
- Forodhani from sunset: fish
Zanzibar is eaten in three places: at the Forodhani stalls in the evening, in places without an English menu at noon, and on a spice farm — the one lunch remembered longer than a week. There is almost no alcohol in town: the island is Muslim and drinking happens in hotels.
Dinner at the stalls
The seafront park turns from sunset into a row of stalls with ice and grills: fish, octopus, prawns, skewers and 'Zanzibar pizza' — dough with egg, meat and cheese, folded and fried on a plate. You choose from the ice, say how many pieces and ask the price before it goes on the grill; that is the one thing separating a good dinner from a surprising bill. Sugar-cane juice with lime and ginger is pressed in front of you.
What is eaten by day
Urojo, also called Zanzibar soup, is a thick turmeric broth with boiled potato, a piece of battered fritter, green mango and hot chutney — lunch for a few thousand shillings, from a stall by the market. Mandazi is fried dough for breakfast, with ginger and cardamom tea. Both are eaten standing and both are better than they look.
Sit-down food
- Pilau — rice cooked with cloves, cinnamon and cardamom, with beef or chicken. The smell that explains why the island is called the spice island.
- Biryani — the same spices, but meat and rice cooked separately then layered; a Sunday dish, in local places usually Saturday and Sunday.
- Fish in coconut milk — mchuzi wa samaki, with rice; the basic Swahili dish and the best measure of a restaurant.
- Octopus curry — tender if made today, rubber if not; ask what is fresh, not what is on the menu.
- Spiced tea — black tea with ginger, cardamom and cinnamon, after the meal rather than with it.
Where not to
- The hotel 'Swahili menu'. The same dish without the heat and for five times the price; a place two streets away has a queue of locals at noon.
- Tap water and stall ice. Bottled water everywhere; ice only in restaurants that make it from bottled.
Before you go
Short answers to what people ask most before setting out.
What does dinner at Forodhani cost?
A few thousand shillings a head if you choose by the piece and ask the price before the grill. Without asking, the bill can be three times that — the one trap of the place.
Is there alcohol on Zanzibar?
In hotels and a couple of bars in Shangani yes; in local places and at stalls no, because the island is Muslim. Kilimanjaro and Serengeti beer are drunk by the sea, not in the bazaar.
What do you eat if you do not eat meat?
Urojo, chapati, coconut rice, lentils and vegetable curry, and fish if you eat it. The Indian heritage means vegetarian food is everywhere, you just look for it in local places rather than at the stalls.
Ready for Stone Town?
Where to next
Stone Town in 2 days
→The maze on day one, spices and Prison Island on day two — two days before the beach, because after a week on…
Nungwi · 50 km
→The northern tip of Zanzibar, the one stretch of coast where you can swim at every tide — and a dhow-building village that became the densest hotel strip on the island
How well does Stone Town suit you?
→Six questions: a score for this place and others like it.
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