Altu’s new Okemos location has traditional Ethiopian breakfast

It’s been about 30 years since Altu Tadesse opened Altu’s Ethiopian Cuisine in East Lansing.

Longtime staff have watched some customers grow from children to adults and as they get older, leave the East Lansing area and miss the convenient access to Ethiopian food.

When Altu’s nephew Gutu Lencha took over in 2023, he heard from some older customers in the Okemos area that they wished they could come in more often, but it was just too inconvenient.

“I met a couple of retirees, who have been really good customers to Altu’s for a long, long time,” Lencha said. “And they’re retired, they don’t drive that much, and several of them complained about the traffic between Grand River and Michigan Avenue. Most of them told me they wish they could have this meal every day, or once a week, but they really don’t like to drive or they don’t have anyone to drive them.”

That got Lencha thinking about opening a location in Okemos, closer to what he said is a large portion of his customer base.

That Okemos location opened doors on March 14, the first Altu’s expansion in its 30-year history. In a location roughly the same size as the original, the restaurant offers the same authentic Ethiopian cuisine, including injera flatbread and beef stew, from shareable “family feasts” to take-out.

The new location coincides with a new menu, adding more stir-fry options as well as a breakfast menu offering authentic Ethiopian breakfast foods. From 8a-10:30 a.m. at the new location, customers can order options such as fir-fir, a traditional Ethiopian breakfast dish made with shredded injera sauteed with onions, tomatoes, garlic, jalapeños and berbere spices; and ful, a spiced fava bean dish.

Lencha said the breakfast menu has good options for vegan and gluten-free customers. Injera is naturally gluten-free because it is not made with wheat flour.

Along with the breakfast menu, Altu’s also now serves traditionally roasted Ethiopian coffee. Ethiopia is the world’s fifth-largest coffee producer, but Lencha said Ethiopian coffee beans are rarely made into Ethiopian-style coffee in the U.S. Rather than roast them in a commercial coffee drum, Altu’s roasts its coffee beans on the stovetop.

Why go through the effort of roasting green coffee beans the old-fashioned way?

“That’s part of sharing the culture,” Lencha said.

Altu’s is also now hosting Ethiopian coffee ceremonies every Saturday, from 3 p.m.-6 p.m., at alternating locations.

Lencha said the new location has already been a marked success, with some customers driving from Williamston to try the breakfast food. Some customers from Ethiopia and surrounding areas are grateful for the chance to eat their regional breakfast cuisine somewhere so close to home, he said, and others are trying it for the first time.

It’s all gratifying, Lencha said, but he’s partial to the first-timers.

“That’s the most exciting part,” he said, “sharing your culture. When people sample your food and like it, that’s the most exciting part.”