This Jamaican-Creole restaurant in Gentilly has the best turkey necks and a hidden patio (2025)

We're still in the high time in New Orleans for outdoor dining, and the best-known spots for open-air perches can be packed. But there's a true hidden gem in Gentilly with a verdant patio just waiting to be discovered.

For our ongoing video series "Eating with Ian," I’ve been taking my colleague Chelsea Shannon around to discover great New Orleans restaurants that should be on your list too.

That's what brought us to Afrodisiac (5363 Franklin Ave., 504-302-2090). That’s a fun name for a bighearted mom-and-pop spot, a cottage-sized restaurant that opens to a large, terraced patio fringed by ginger and palmetto.

Kay and Shaka Garel started out with a food truck and a menu blending his roots in Jamaica and hers in Louisiana. That truck was crushed by a falling tree when it was parked outside the couple's home during Hurricane Zeta in 2020. But soon a wave of community support helped buoy the business, and by 2022 they opened their own restaurant in Gentilly.

It expands on the food truck menu and adds a bar for a casual, welcoming Creole/island fusion restaurant that feels just right for New Orleans.

Crawfish etouffee fries are a fun place to start, and the buttery BBQ shrimp are ignited by jerk flavor. The first peppery bite pops on the palate and then keeps coming, not overwhelming, but robust and riveting.

But the sleeper hit are the turkey necks. You have to commit to turkey necks and really get in there between the ridges of bone, and these delicious examples paid off as we mined every juicy, smoky, peppery morsel.

For entrees, the oxtails in a rich, dark gravy is another you’ll want to take down to the bone. The the shrimp stew is bright and soulful, like back-of-the-stove cooking. It blends Louisiana flavor and island vibrancy beautifully, with plump shrimp mixing it up with smoked sausage and potatoes in a curry sauce.

Afrodisiac tastes like the islands, and that goes for the bar too. I like the Three Little Birds cocktail (with rum and lime and agave) and a rum punch that’s potent and not too sweet.

The restaurant presents a blink-and-you-missed-it storefront from the street, but once you walk inside it keeps going.

A mural of African beauty and Louisiana food bounty by Lionel Milton adorns one wall. A pattern of iridescent irises covers another. Little touches of personality and color appear across the small dining rooms leading out to the patio.

You’d never suspect this patio waiting back here, but once you go to Afrodisiac you’ll always remember it.

It’s another great find as Chelsea and I keep exploring the vibrant New Orleans restaurant scene. Subscribe to our newsletter Where NOLA Eats and you can follow along.

Afrodisiac

5363 Franklin Ave., 504-302-2090

Wed., Thu. 4-9 p.m., Fri., Sat. 11 a.m.-10 p.m., Sun. 11 a.m.-4 p.m.