- italian
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I asked the guy at my hotel for a good restaurant, a place where locals go to, and he sent me to this place. It's near Rialto.
To be honest, we saw the queue and for a while we thought of not going in, but we waited (not for long, the service is very quick, maybe too quick) and the place was great. Fantastic food, good prices and a lot of locals.
Calle d. Madonna,San Polo 594
www.ristoranteallamadonna.com/
Well above average Italian, breaks the usual tourist rule that if there is an English menu the food is downmarket - useful if you struggle with German vocab for food. Friendly English speaking staff.
Linzergasse 10, new town - river end of the street, just a doorway between shops
An Italian restaurant with an interesting menu that covers pasta and pizza but has much more interesting things too. Very friendly service, quite spacious, reasonable prices. I got a table easily on a Saturday evening without booking - a much more attractive option than the noisy and heaving Pizza Express next door!
11 St Benedicts St, Norwich, NR2 4PE -less than 5 mins stroll from City Hall and the market.
This restaurant can be a bit hard to find but worth the effort. Tiny little place with the tables close to one another. Our waiter was wonderful. He brought the pasta dishes in the pot they were cooked in and sang while he put it on the plate, giving us each a taste of each other's meal. Very reasonably priced for the Pantheon area. Two courses with wine for two people was 55 euros. Reservations are recommended.
Osteria Del Sostegno
www.ilsostegno.it
Italian restaurant based in Mumbai. It's the best Italian food in India if not in Asia.
Juhu, across the road from the Marriott
Wonderful restaurant, only Italians eating there and with the best lasagna I've ever eaten [out of a lot of competition]. Good pizza too.
Via Caldarese, 5
Not really a cocktail bar, but a cocktail lounge in a lovely Italian restaurant. Makes the only proper vodka martini I've ever tasted in Ireland. Also has the best pasta.
The Mall, Waterford City. www.lapalma.ie
This quality Italian place, focused on simply executed dishes based on fresh produce is a great new addition to the surprisingly limited St Albans dining scene.
Despite its affluence and increasing popularity as one of the nicest places to commute to London from, St Albans has a pretty disappointing range of places to eat out. Sure, there's the creditable Darcy's on Hatfield Road, a recent addition to the slick Loch Fyne seafood chain on Verulam Road (plus a great, unpretentious curry house in Mumtaj on London Road) but that's about it. Until now.
Cibo DiVino opened in summer 2007 and despite its central, if relatively unprepossessing location behind M&S and Boots there are treats in store.
Service is warm and welcoming, the room is cosy and well lit, homemade bread is offered with your apertif (we had a couple of glasses of appley house Prosecco).
The focus is on fresh regional Italian food (think modern Italian style championed by the likes of the River Cafe or Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall). Some examples from the short but appetising menu are: antipasti (say, buffalo mozzarella with grilled vegetables, an autumnal lentil soup), pasta (I had a delicious rabbit and black olive ragu with fettuccine but there was also linguine with clams), fish (simply grilled whole bream, scallops with cauliflower puree), meat and game (guinea fowl with polenta, a veal chop), vegetables and desserts (honey semi-freddo, tiramisu).
Expect to pay about £50 a head for the works: aperitifs, three courses, a good bottle of wine, coffee. We were offered a complimentary digestif.
We really hope this charming place is a success - it fills a much needed space and does so really well.
Cibo DiVino Ristorante Italiano
4-5 Waddington Road
St. Albans
AL3 5EX
www.cibodivino.co.uk
Tel 01727899189
St Albans City (mainline/Thameslink) or St Albans Abbey (branch line from Watford/Silverlink)
Convivio Rome run Italian Cooking Holidays in a little medieval hilltop village called Toffia, which lies, in a magnificent region called Sabina, just north of Rome, in Italy.
I would highly recommend them as my friend and I had a wonderful week and we loved the casual but hugely informative and enjoyable cooking sessions, which were great fun and provided loads of insight into real Italian cooking. We actually got to stay in a little home inside the
ancient walls of Toffia, it was great to feel like one of the locals!
One of the highlights for me was the local olive grove tour as the information provided was interesting and valuable, the tasting delicious, and the whole thing a very welcoming experience.
All in all, they gave us a great balance of cooking, sightseeing, tours and leisure. Thanks go to Guido and Sally who run the holidays, for a great week filled with warmth, personal care, refreshing simplicity and a huge helping of inspiration.
Toffia, region of Sabina, near Rome in Italy.
Phone: ++39 0765 326 144
www.conviviorome.com
Great Italian restaurant serving hearty fare. Fantastic atmosphere best experienced as part of a crowd. Be prepared to ‘Stand up, stand up, stand up and shake your napkin!’
189 Hester St
New York, NY 10013
Little Italy
The best Italian restaurant in the town. Way better than the more established Nick's Italian Kitchen attached to Kungas Guesthouse. The only problem is that this place doesn't benefit from the panoramic views of the former, but the food more than compensates. Run by a friendly Tibetan - try the chilli chicken pasta, it is awesome!
Joglbara Road, towards the main square if walking from Post Office on the right hand side.
Every time we go to Santa Rosa we always dine at LoCoco’s. The reason? Simple: it’s the best Italian restaurant we’ve been to outside Italy. They offer fresh pasta, fish and meat dishes cooked in a traditional way. The fettucine al cinghiale (wild boar fettucine) is superb. Linguine alle vongole (clam linguine); pasta shells stuffed with spinach and ricotta; penne con salsiccia are but a few of their dishes. But before you can enjoy a trip to culinary Italy, you’re brought a breadbasket with several slices of gorgeous bread and a little bowl of either olive oil or green olive tapenade. So whilst you’re looking at the menu and trying to decide what to indulge yourself with, you can start dipping those thick slices into a bit of Italy.
The service is also unbeatable and all the waiters are charming in the Italian way. They’ll give you a list of special dishes of the day and will help you make your choice if you’re a bit stuck or overwhelmed.
Try to leave a bit of room in your stomach, for the desserts at LoCoco’s are a must. The tiramisù is a favourite, but they’ve also got cannoli and profiterol just to name a couple.
The only drawback at LoCoco’s, we find, is that it fills very fast and it’s usually packed. So we suggest booking in advance and, if possible, early in the week or at mid-week, but try to avoid Friday or Saturday evenings as the staff are so busy that you may have to wait a bit too long for your food.
NB: There are other LoCoco’s in the US but they are not related to LoCoco’s Cucina Rustica, Santa Rosa.
LoCoco’s Cucina Rustica
Historic Railroad Square
117 Fourth Street
Santa Rosa, CA 95401
Phone: (707) 523 2227
Fax: (707) 523 2902
This is a great new Italian restaurant in Clifton Village. As a small independent restaurant it offers a seasonal menu.The owner/head chef is from Veneto the northeast region of Italy and this forms the flavour of the menu. Having only opened Nov (06) it has had many favourable reviews. Metro four stars
25,The Mall
Clifton Village
BS8 4JG
0117 973 4499
www.proseccoclifton.com
This Italian cafe is owned by the Varani family and is well known by locals and people in Glasgow. Its vanilla ice cream is not too sweet and has a pale brown colour and is absolutely delicious! My late dad Sam used to make special trips and buy a large container to bring home when I was a little child and my mouth is watering at the moment of writing!
37 High Glencairn Street
Kilmarnock
Ayrshire
Italian Cafe. Good caff snacks of the Italian variety but truly delicious, excellent quality, homemade ice cream in a multitude of flavours (try a dollop of chocolate and a dollop of pistachio.. or hazel.. the strawberry is v. good too... oh dear. I'm getting over excited!
Eating a Marrocco's ice cream whilst staring at the sea is an essential Brighton experience.
On The Kingsway Beach Front (near King Alfred Centr)e.
Eating out in Dublin can be really expensive, so we looked out for quiet bistro-type places with special offer lunch menus.
We got 2-3 courses, sometimes with a free glass of house red for as little as eight euros a head, great service and fairly quiet and huge portions.
Evening menu's were pretty much the same but cost over 20 euros a head! Temple Bar had enough resaurants to last us the 5 days we were in Dublin, yum! Then there was a fantastic ice crem parlour on the walk back to our hostel - believe me, by this time, we needed the walk!
Temple Bar is a good area of Dublin to find small good quality restaurants, particularly Italian.
If you need to absorb the excess of the night before, or stock up before a day in town, get a full breakfast here. This is Glasgow/Italian fusion cuisine at its best; no nonsense, honest and affordable. The Italian sausage is fantastic and the coffee is how it should be.
360 Great Western Road
www.cafecherubini.com/
This is an excellent Italian restaurant on Dohany Utca near the main road Rakoczi Ut. The food is of good quality and the portions impressive. Try one of their pizzas, almost impossible to finish. The staff are friendly and the atmosphere good. It's also reasonably priced.
1077 Budapest, Dohany Utca 40. Tel 354-07-88
A fantastic new restaurant in Golders Green, excellent Italian food, the best I have tasted for a long time, lovely relaxing atmoshpere with live music.
38 North End Road, London NW11 7PT.
Tel: 020 8458 6344
Opposite Golders Green tube.
D&C is an 'enoteco' serving wonderful Italian food and a host of wines by the glass. Service is with a smile and staff are knowledgeable and concerned that you enjoy the food. Busy, buzzy, cheap and never fails to cheer.
Just off Nassau Street, close to Trinity College and Grafton Street
www.dunneandcrescenzi.com
14/16 South Frederick Street,
City Centre D2
Tel: 01 677 3815 / 675 9892
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