Spur outlets aren’t widely popular in Lagos. The South African family restaurant and its franchises are predominantly steakhouses, but also serve a variety of family-friendly items. Thus the interior is laid out in intimate booths and round tables that can sit groups of four or more, with playpens for kids. The outlet at the Ikeja City Mall serves the best, sizable cups of rich milkshakes that come in a variety of flavors: classic strawberry, banana and chocolate, or kiwi. Couple your glass of milkshake with Spur’s signature burger, a ground beef burger served with a side of fries or salad, and you have a filling meal worth every naira. [$$]

Suya is a popular barbecued chicken or beef usually grilled over an open fire and served with a northern spice mixture, yajichurri, lots of onions, and sometimes a helping of cabbage or some other vegetables. If you ever find suya being prepared or served before the sun goes down, please — I cannot stress this enough — do not buy it. It’s an adage that suya tastes best after day is done, and that the best ones are prepared and sold under the cover of night. This acclaimed university, named to attract foodies, on Allen Avenue in Ikeja attracts long lines most nights for its famed suya — best washed down with a cold drink of your choice, or milk to temper the spice. [$$]

Ocean Basket might be one of the pricier places to eat on the Lagos mainland, but it’s also home to the best seafood platter in Lagos. Add to that the aesthetically pleasing space — think handwritten food notes on a white-chalk wall, pastel furniture, and chandeliers hanging from a ceiling that mirrors a sea wave — and the rooftop dining-area restaurant, and suddenly the bill doesn’t seem so bad. The full-deck platter with prince prawns, mussels, calamari, calamari steak strips, and fish is ideal for a party of five or more, but there are smaller versions too, if you’re splurging solo. [$$$$]

Kaldi House brings the best of East African cuisine to the West, along with stellar Ethiopian coffee, roasted and brewed on-site. First launched as a coffee roastery, it’s expanded into a casual restaurant serving Ethiopian meals like injera, a spongy flatbread that doubles as a utensil for the dollops of vegetable sauces and stews covering its surface. The East African couple running the place are more than willing to give a tour of the coffee roastery. [$$ – $$$]

This intimate restaurant, tucked away in an industrial area on the Lagos mainland, is a perfect spot to try the best of both Chinese and Indian cooking. Think: fried rice, sesame rolls, chicken tikka masala, and tandoori prawns. Come hungry — you’ll need plenty of room for Gypsy’s massive portions. [$$ – $$$]

No relation to that other White House, this busy semi-street-food restaurant on the Lagos mainland makes one of the best jollofs in the state. While most street-food stalls in Lagos are makeshift kitchenettes under large umbrellas, White House is a modest, white-walled restaurant with an open kitchen where customers are served food straight from the fire. What makes a good jollof is constantly up for debate, but a distinct smoky taste from an open fire is one of them. White House jollof tastes like firewood jollof, as we like to put it. [$]

Imported by the Lebanese, Nigerian shawarma has quickly become the most popular street food in Lagos. Nigerian shawarma doesn’t differ much from the original: It comprises vegetables, sausages, and marinated chicken grilled on a vertical spit, along with some sour cream, all wrapped in flatbread. At Best Shawarma, you can choose between a chicken or beef shawarma and have the option of adding thin sausages to the roll. [$$]

Making your way through a bowl of Olaiya’s amala and ewedu/gbegiri soup is a rite of passage for western Nigerians. Amala is a fluffy meal made from dried yam, cassava, or plantain flour that gets made into a super-soft light brown or black meal served with a generous helping of gbegiri, a bean soup that is often mixed with its slimier twin, ewedu. Ewedu is made from its namesake vegetable, which is cooked, ground, and seasoned. You can also get amala with any of the other soups offered here, or a spinach and tomato sauce called éfọ́. [$]

“Small chops” is a Nigerian term for street snacks, a tradition of small bites somewhere in the realm of appetizers and hors d’oeuvres that can include everything from Indian samosas to Chinese spring rolls, barbecued meat, peppered gizzard, and beignet-like puff puffs — the most popular item in the ensemble. While there are a hundred or more places to buy puff puffs in Lagos, check out the vendors around the Lagos Marina, where the famous Cathedral Church of Christ sits. Puff puffs are light and fluffy, made with a generous amount of oil — and you get so much for so little money. [$]

At Danfo Bistro, one of the city’s popular street foods — ewa agoyin— has been repackaged and is served in a space that’s pure Lagos. Ewa agoyin is made of beans cooked to mush and served with freshly baked bread. At Danfo Bistro, fried plantain cubes top the classic street-food combo. Finger foods like chicken wings are served in strips of newspaper-like packing material, mirroring how street-food vendors pack them. The space is also worthy of note: The decor reimagines Lagos’s popular yellow buses as eating booths, showcasing the signature black-and-yellow stamp of these buses as well as other iconic motifs of Lagos. [$$$]

Circa is the place to go on a date if you want them to swoon over your incredible taste. Here, the restaurant offers a local and Continental menu, including fresh Greek vegetable salads prepared using vegetables grown in the restaurant’s hydroponics farm. At the bar overlooking the lagoon, however, be sure to ask for the signature cocktail, a sweet, peach concoction served with a wedge of lemon called Okoloko. The recipe is a secret, but the potent wallop of the rum is hard to miss. [$$$]

If you are a coffee lover looking to get your fix in Lagos, visit My Coffee Wings, which sits on the first floor of a new office complex along Ozumba Mbadiwe Avenue on the Lagos Island. The spacious outdoor coffee shop overlooks the Lagos Lagoon and skyline, making it perfect for a personal or business meeting. Note the little angels on the walls that usher you into the space, placed there by artist Peju Alatise. The thin pancakes with strawberry sauce go well with a latte, or consider ordering a proper English breakfast with some sweet crepes on the side. [$$ – $$$]

Chef Eric Kayser’s restaurant may be known for its Italian offerings, like the delicious pastas, but you should visit for the freshly made pastries. His eponymous franchise is a French bakery and patisserie, but its Lagos debut is a full-fledged restaurant with starter and main-course dishes. Make sure to try the quiche and award-winning croissants. [$$ – $$$]

Alara is a high-end African fashion brand that has expanded its luxury aesthetic to African cuisine via its fine dining restaurants, NOK and NOK Garden. Chef Pierre Thiam is behind dishes like abula, which it only serves on Thursdays. Abula is a more luxurious version of amala, a light brown or black fluffy meal made from cassava or yam flour. Also in the service offering is thiebou jenn, the Senegalese version of Nigerian jollof, served with a generous portion of flavourful steamed onions. [$$$ – $$$$]