"Eater" x ChopnBlok

The 8 Best Meals I Ate This Year

by Kayla Stewart read the full article here

From clam toast in New York to rabbit stew in France, here’s what Eater senior editor Kayla Stewart enjoyed eating most in 2024

Buka stew at ChòpnBlọk in Houston

ChòpnBlọk is about as nontraditional as it gets. The chef, Ope Amosu, didn’t go to culinary school; he cooked on the line at Chipotle at night while working in the corporate world by day. Jollof and jambalaya, related one-pot dishes in the Black diaspora, are sometimes served together. The mom-and-pop atmosphere that characterizes most West African restaurants in Houston is, at ChòpnBlọk, contemporary and youthful. So it’s ironic that one of my favorite dishes at the new Montrose location is buka stew — the highly traditional Nigerian red stew (of course, with an Amosu take). Served with rice and split by a row of sweet, chewy plantains, the stew I can’t stop ordering makes a promising case that Black diasporic food can be both traditional and contemporary — neither invalidating the other; instead, forming something wholly new and wonderful.