There’s never a bad time to start savoring the flavors of Black-owned restaurants in Nevada, but Black Business Month is especially timely.
The Las Vegas and Reno Black-owned restaurants featured below consistently draw rave reviews from diners for their food, ambiance, and hospitality. Some of these standout spots have even been featured on the Food Network, and one is helmed by a James Beard Award-winning chef.
From intimate dives to a high-end restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip, check out these 11 Black-owned restaurants in Nevada during Black Business Month and beyond.
Le Bon Goût Chez Fa
3920 W. Charleston Blvd., Ste. A, Las Vegas
Senegalese restaurant Le Bon Gout Chez Fa serves authentic West African recipes passed down through generations. The menu includes traditional favorites like jollof rice, poisson braise, yassa guina, and oxtail stew, along with drinks like Senegalese tea, ditakh juice, bissap, and bouye. While this taste of coastal Africa is available to-go, customers on Yelp complimented the flavors, spices, and hospitality, noting it’s “worth the wait” to dine inside.
Zenaida’s Cafe
3430 E. Tropicana Ave., Las Vegas
Founded in 2016, family-owned Zenaida’s Cafe frequently ranks high in Yelp’s restaurant listings for breakfast, brunch, and lunch, including its Top 100 Places to Eat in the US in 2023 and 2024. Chef Sterling Burpee’s inventive comfort food menu includes everything from cinnamon rolls to country fried steak, with several vegetarian and vegan options. Customers on Yelp write that the cafe has a “mom and pop, small business vibe,” an “old-fashioned diner feel,” delicious food, and complimentary cookies.
Gritz Café
1911 Stella Lake St., Ste. 150, Las Vegas
For a Southern-inspired breakfast and friendly service, head to Gritz Café, located in the Historic Westside of Las Vegas. Founded by Las Vegas native Trina Jiles in 2008, the menu includes soul food favorites like fried chicken, po-boys, grits, collard greens, and buttery peach pie, with vegetarian and gluten-free items, and kids’ meals. Gritz Café frequently lands on the Best of Las Vegas list for the Las Vegas Review Journal, and customers on Yelp write that the hype is real. They call it a “must try” restaurant.
Lo-Lo’s Chicken and Waffles
325 Hughes Center Dr., Las Vegas
Located less than a mile East of the Las Vegas Strip, Lo-Lo’s Chicken and Waffles serves up Southern hospitality and fried chicken with a secret blend of spices. The waffle mix and homemade maple syrup are also secret recipes cooked up by owner Larry “Lo-Lo” White. It’s no secret, however, that Lo-Lo’s is a hit. This place is frequently busy, and while a customer on Yelp notes that it can be difficult waiting outside in the summer, “Once you finally make it inside … the atmosphere is electric, the décor is inviting, and honestly … It feels alive in there.”
Calabash African Kitchen
1750 S. Rainbow Blvd., Ste. 8, Las Vegas
At Calabash African Kitchen, Gambian Chef Oulay Ceesay Fisher carries on her family’s West African cooking traditions, including wood-fired grilling. The restaurant, which opened in 2022, serves a combination of Senegalese and Gambian food, including jollof rice, whole grilled fish, homemade juices, and a Senegambian Long Island. Customers write on Yelp that everything is perfectly spiced and the “meat was literally falling off the bone.” Some who walked in having never eaten African cuisine “walked out planning our next visit.”
Maroon by Kwame Onwuachi
Sahara Las Vegas
James Beard Award-winning Chef Kwame Onwuachi helms the upscale Afro-Caribbean steakhouse Maroon by Kwame Onwuachi on the Las Vegas Strip. This is the first West Coast restaurant for the celebrity chef, who was honored as one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2025. Customers write on Yelp that they like the ambiance, decor, cleanliness, and overall vibe at the restaurant, and call eating here “a culinary experience.”
House of Dutch Pot
4255 S. Durango Dr., Las Vegas
Featured on Season 37 of the Food Network’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” House of Dutch Pot is the brainchild of Jamaican Chef Oniel Smith. He developed a love for cooking as a boy while helping his grandmother in the kitchen in Morant Bay, St. Thomas. Standouts on the Caribbean menu include oxtail mac and cheese wontons, jerk chicken tacos, Rasta pasta, and oxtail wraps, plus drinks like Island fruit punch and a frozen guava daiquiri. Not only do customers on Yelp write that the food is incredible, but many complimented the hospitality. “You can tell they care about the food and the customer experience.”
M&Ms Southern Cafe
820 Holman Way, Sparks
A family-friendly restaurant, M&M’s Southern Cafe serves Southern comfort foods like oxtail, gumbo, chicken and waffles, and Southern fried catfish, as well as alligator and frog legs. But the all-time customer favorite here is the nostalgia-inducing Kool-Aid. “This is legit Louisiana cuisine,” writes a customer on Yelp. Customers also complimented the fast and friendly service, the atmosphere, and the aroma. “Well worth every penny spent.”
Papa What You Cooking
50 S. Virginia St., Reno
Featured on Season 43 of Guy Fieri’s “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives,” Papa What You Cooking owner and chef William Lyons serves New Orleans-inspired soul recipes passed down through the family for generations. There’s shrimp and grits, red rice and beans, and a po’ boy of roast beef and gravy, along with homemade sweet treats like peach cobbler and over 20 other flavors of homemade sorbet. Customers are extremely complimentary about the food on Yelp, writing that it’s “absolutely off the chain“ with oxtail meat that falls off the bone. Customers also appreciate the service and vibe, describing it as a cool place with an “underground feel.”
Jamaica Jerk Spot
Various locations in Reno and Sparks
With a food truck and a food trailer, Jamaica Jerk Spot shares island flavors throughout Reno and Sparks, bringing dishes like jerk chicken, oxtail, and plantains to many communities. The restaurant moves locations, so check the Jamaica Jerk Spot Instagram for the weekly schedule. Customers on Yelp write that “when it pops up,” this is the spot to eat at. If you’re craving Jamaican flavors, Jamaica Jerk Spot “scratches that craving … every time.”
The Recipe Box
4826 Longley Ln., Reno
Davery and Dominique Spears are a sweet addition to Reno, moving to the Biggest Little City in 2018. At their dessert shop The Recipe Box, they serve homemade pies, cobblers, and “the best cheesecake I’ve ever had” (via Yelp), with menu items including blueberry crumble cheesecake, banana cream pie, and their award-winning Sakura cheesecake. You’ll also find mini cheesecakes, cheesecake by the slice, and other delicious desserts available for purchase in-store or online.
This article first appeared on Good Info News Wire and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
