Makina Cafe - Long Island City

Makina Cafe is an established woman-owned Eritrean and Ethiopian hospitality company. We started as a food truck in 2017, added a seasonal stall on Governors Island and a production commissary that supplies all of our concepts plus catering, and in 2025 opened our first full-service brick-and-mortar dining room on Skillman Avenue in Sunnyside/Long Island City - the first Eritrean-Ethiopian restaurant in the famously diverse borough of Queens. The dining room seats 53 and serves dinner Tuesday through Sunday.

Makina's mission is to serve delicious East African food without fear of putting a spin on this time-honored cuisine, and to educate our public about the history and culture behind this revered, long-standing culinary tradition in a welcoming, hospitable environment. Our hospitality is built on the Three R's - Receive, Reverence, Return - and on traditions like the coffee ceremony (jebena buna), gursha, and communal eating.