Chez Loutcha

Chez Loutcha has been serving huge plates of Cape Verdean cachupa and Senegalese thieboudienne to day-trippers on Île de Gorée for some thirty years. There's no menu — Loutcha simply tells you what's on that day — and it's cash-only, so come prepared. The portions are the stuff of legend: a single plate could comfortably feed three, which makes it remarkable value at around £12 a head. It's a canteen rather than a restaurant, unfussy and busy, exactly the kind of honest cooking that's become harder to find on the more touristy stretches of the island. Most people fold it into a Gorée day trip from Dakar, between the Maison des Esclaves and the afternoon ferry back. Arrive hungry, don't expect frills, and you'll see why it's been a Gorée institution for three decades.