Fast food in Yaoundé: yes, it's not healthy… but when your belly calls, eat!
Poulet mayo, BHB, dripping burgers, shawarma eaten on the go, then a film at the Majestic. Yes, not every day. But when hunger talks, here is where to go, no lecture, no fuss.
By L'équipe NiceThings15 October 20266 min read
Let's be honest, friend. Crispy fried chicken, a burger dripping down your fingers, fries still hot, shawarma eaten on the go: not what the doctor ordered. We know. But when your belly calls at 10 pm after work, or when the gang asks “where do we meet?”, fast food shows up. So no lecture here: we tell you where to go. The diet starts Monday.
Poulet mayo, the star from Kinshasa
Before it turned heads here, poulet mayo grew up in Kinshasa. According to Reuters, the recipe was born around 2018 at a street restaurant in the Bandalungwa neighbourhood: pieces of chicken grilled over a wood fire, spices, vegetables and mayonnaise. Lots of mayonnaise. The name does not lie.
In Yaoundé, one place even took it as its name: POULET MAYO, in Mokolo. According to the open map (surveyed in May 2026), it serves grills, sandwiches and chicken, and takes cash or cards.
Grills, sandwiches, chicken. Cash or card, according to the open map.
Tchop et Yamo: fast food, the Cameroonian way
“Tchop et Yamo” means “eat and enjoy” in our local English. Its promoter Idriss Nguepnang had a simple idea: take Western-style fast food and put at its heart what we already eat on the street corner, beignets, beans and bouillie. The famous BHB. In early 2025 the chain even teamed up with Tradex filling stations to serve BHB at the pump, in Yaoundé and Douala.
Burgers and shawarma: a tour of the city
Team burger? In Bastos, Kazoo and The Burger Bar. In Mokolo, Snap Burger. In the PlaYce mall, Oui Noon!. And The Nook, brand new on the map, also in Bastos.
For a burger
Team shawarma? Okebab in Nlongkak, Istanbul in Bastos, which Culture Trip recommends for its kebabs, shawarma and pizzas, and Seven Hills in Elig-Essono, Lebanese and Turkish food, burgers included.
For shawarma or a kebab
Team chicken, and the pizzas
Chicken is sacred. Chicken Dex in Simbock, La Force du Poulet downtown and at PlaYce, Rotisserie Alino in Bastos. For pizza: Dolcezza on the Nouvelle Route Bastos (pizzas, grills, breaded chicken and Italian ice cream, according to its website), Le Carino at PlaYce, La Buona Pizza in Nlongkak.
Chicken and pizzas
After the meal, the movies
Yaoundé went a long time without a big cinema. The Abbia, once called the “temple of culture”, the last of the city's eight cinemas, closed on 12 January 2009: within a week the country lost its last three cinemas, with the Wouri in Douala and the Empire in Bafoussam. In 2016 a CanalOlympia cinema opened on the University of Yaoundé I campus. It passed to the university, then in December 2025 to the Ivorian group Majestic One, and is now called Majestic Yaoundé I University: it officially reopened on 27 February 2026. So the weekend combo is set: a burger, a shawarma, then the big screen.
The campus cinema in Ngoa-Ekélé. Programme and prices on its official website.
The truth, between us
All the fast food in town
Every place in one spot: Fast food in Yaoundé, in Douala, and for team chicken, In the mood for chicken. Torn between two places? Save them and let the group vote.
Your turn
- Your favourite fast food, the one nobody knows yet?
- Team poulet mayo or team shawarma?
- A place we missed, a “Crispy” in your neighbourhood? Add it: we check it, and it joins the list.
Answer in a comment, just below.
Sources: Reuters, on poulet mayo; Reuters, on Tchop et Yamo; Investir au Cameroun (January 2025, in French); Culture Trip; Dolcezza's official website; Afrique contemporaine (2011), on the Abbia's closure; Cameroon Tribune, 11 December 2025 and 2 March 2026 (in French); the Majestic's official website; OpenStreetMap. Photos via Wikimedia Commons: Gnangcomapp (opening photo), Sid Mbog, Horacio Cambeiro (CC BY-SA 3.0), Weetjesman, Neil Conway (CC BY 2.0), Martyns Photography Media, Sq2id, Albert Bergonzo; CC BY-SA 4.0 unless stated.
Every place on the map
16 places mentioned in this article
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