The Shark Express

Aaron Mall, 12 Olubunmi Owa Street, Lekki Phase I | Instagram | 0809 306 5555

I’ve been craving a really good seafood boil for a while now, so I knew the stars were aligning when I came across The Shark Express on Instagram. Their entire page is a seafood lover’s dream, so I was so ready to try them out.

The Shark Express is a rooftop restaurant, so it’s pretty breezy and chill. The vibe is sort of raffia meets flowery, meets bukka, meets underwater (this is literally the only way I can explain it 😆), with a decorative aquarium and a pool table, which I think is always a good idea. To keep things airy and comfortable, there are cooling fans strategically placed around the space, which I was very grateful for because 🥵🥵 The downside to that is: Because it’s an open space, you’ll end up having one too many flies to deal with… but hey.

From the moment we walked in, the servers were pretty much chasing my guest and I down with the menus, so points for enthusiasm, and every time I had a request or concern, someone was always there to attend to me with a smile.

We kicked off with beer, which didn’t get to us on time, and meant they were more or less room temp. In my opinion — and this should really be a universal standard — if you’re serving beer, it has to be ‘mortuary cold’ (unless stated otherwise); there’s no actual in between. So, I definitely didn’t care for them.

When it came to the food, I felt like I probably should have had eba before leaving the house, because little did I know our meals would take so long to come out. The hope was that it would be worth the wait — but unfortunately, that wasn’t the case.

I ordered the seafood boil I’d been dreaming of, which was supposed to come with prawns, crawfish, clams, mussels, crab, corn and potatoes (I also ordered an extra side of potatoes, sausages and eggs to add to the boil). Lo and behold, I got zero prawns, a sh*t ton of crawfish, some crabs, potatoes and 2 mussels, one of which had an empty shell. The servers brought only the side of corn I ordered, none in the boil and none of my extras.

By this time, I was so tired and hungry that I didn’t even have time to complain, I just dug in. On the plus side, the Cajun butter sauce was really nice, but none of it seeped into the seafood, which was really a shame and made it quite underwhelming. The corn was really soft and buttery, and I got to dip it in the Cajun sauce, which tasted mucho delicioso. The potatoes, as well, were soft and very yum, but the absolute star of the show, for me, was the garlic bread. I expected it to be a bit crunchy, but it was all soft and light, which turned out great. Perfect garlic-butter-bread ratio — delicious!

On the side (yes, another side!), I ordered their shrimp fried rice and fish, and the disappointment only continued. I got a bowl of cold fried rice, garnished with plantains and a single shrimp on top. Basically, the message was: Mix the rice and the one shrimp and it’ll turn to shrimp fried rice in your mouth, abi? 🤷🏾‍♀️

And this review would not be complete without pointing out that for a seafood restaurant, the actual seafood at The Shark Express was not quite fresh. That’s just a no-no, friends — a big no-no.

Postscript

I really hope they were just having an off day. Try it out, they might surprise you.

Verdict

Damage

Corn - N1000 (each)

Garlic Butter Bread (3 pcs) - N2000

Heineken - N1500

Seafood Boil - N8000

Shrimp Fried Rice (with Fish) - N6000

Water - N700

Parking

Quite reasonable, since the restaurant is in a mall.