Naija Boy Tacos, the only Nigerian taqueria in the US, is closing in Sacramento. Here’s when
Rasheed Amedu’s one-of-a-kind Nigeria taqueria, Naija Boy Tacos, is shutting down — at least for now.
The open-air Mansion Flats restaurant will close on April 30 after just six months, Amedu announced Thursday morning on Instagram.
It’ll go out with a bang, ending service with its second Shakara brunch event. In March, that meant a celebration of suya chicken wings, lamb chorizo breakfast sandwiches and pét-nat wine, along with Afro-beat from DJ Fiji.
“Alright y’all, I’m gonna keep this short and sweet. We are closing Naija Boy Tacos on April 30th after our SHAKARA brunch. We’ve always had an expiration date at this location; it just came a little early,” Amedu wrote
Naija Boy Tacos was always intended to be at 628 15th St. for a good time, not a long time. Local development firm Urban Capital has planned to develop a 26-unit apartment building on that patch of land near downtown Sacramento since before Naija Boy opened.
Amedu will eventually open a more upscale Cali-Nigerian restaurant called Iya-Mi (Yoruba for “my mother”) on that building’s ground floor. He previously floated the idea of reopening Naija Boy elsewhere in interviews with The Sacramento Bee; on Thursday morning, he couldn’t be reached for comment.
While Naija Boy was always destined to end, six months in business was shorter than anticipated. Naija Boy Tacos had trouble getting the necessary operating permits, pushing back an intended summer opening to October.
That built anticipation, as did pop-ups in Sacramento and the Bay Area. A former sous chef at Urban Roots Brewery & Smokehouse, TableVine and Origami Asian Grill, Amedu combined his parents’ West African roots with the Cali-Mex cuisine of his adopted home to create the country’s known first Nigerian taqueria.
As customers came out for goat curry tacos, suya-spiced chicken milanesa and plantain/cassava tortillas, Naija Boy caught the national spotlight. The New York Times mentioned it in an article predicting how the nation would eat in 2023.
This story was originally published April 20, 2023 at 11:55 AM.