Rate my Bistro

This is Carluccios flagship restaurant and it is spread over two floors. The entrance and interior reminded me of a grand home. It has high ceilings, stone floors and a big spiral staircase. We were seated on the upper level, which looked like the private dining area. There are huge windows that overlook the surrounding streets of Covent Garden. It felt like we were dining in a stately home!

The starter of foccacia bread was a big piece. It was a little heavy and plain to have as a starter dish even though it was served with olive oil to dip in.

The Arancini Di Riso Siciliani are two fried rice balls served with a red pepper sauce. One of the rice balls has a mozzarella filling and the other has meat ragu. I found that even just one of the rice balls is quite filling but what would complement this dish would be a salad.rn

rnThe Pasta E Fagioli soup is described on the menu as being a thick soup with vegetables, borlotti beans and pasta. It was more of a broth based soup and not as rich as I would have expected it to be.

I have tried two different main dishes at Carluccios and definitely have a preference. I would recommend having the Penne Giardiniera. The pasta is served with a nice mixture of courgettes, fried spinach balls, chilli and comes with Parmesan and garlic. The flavours and textures of this dish really work together!

I really did not enjoy the homemade ravioli. The filling was spinach and ricotta. This dish was not at all filling. It tasted really bland even though it was served with butter and sage. Also, the side dish of spinach with garlic was average.

The Tiramisu is a fantastic dessert! It has the perfect combination of coffee, cream and chocolate. The portion was enough to share!

If you fancy something sweet, but don’t really want a dessert, then you should try the Ciocolatta. This is a satisfying thick hot chocolate with frothy milk on top. If you don’t want the spoonable hot chocolate, then you can always ask for extra hot milk on the side and dilute the chocolate down a bit!

The cappuccino is good and creamy and a nice drink to have at the end of the meal. Carluccios do not serve soy milk.

The staff were really friendly and the service was good. Carluccios have a shop on the ground floor where you can buy lots of Italian goodies and treats!

Carluccios, Garrick Street, Covent Garden, London, WC2E 9BH

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Rocca di Papa had such a warm and welcoming feel. It made a refreshing change to other restaurants. What was striking was the original brickwork walls, big canvas pictures and high ceilings. This building used to be part of Christie’s auction house.

The waitress was really friendly and didn’t mind me waiting for a while at the table for my friends to arrive. It made a nice relaxing start to the evening. I did notice that there were a lot of tables reserved but we were lucky to get a table without making a reservation. The service was quick, efficient and the waitress made the effort to recommend items on the menu and to make conversation with me.rn

I wanted to try a couple of things from the menu as quite a few of the dishes sounded really nice. So, I went for some starter dishes instead of one main meal. The homemade minestrone soup was great. It had plenty of chunks of potato, carrots and celery and other vegetables. It was more of a broth based soup rather than tomato and it also did not have any pasta pieces.

To accompany the soup, I really enjoyed the Perdi Tempo pizza bread. It was not a huge portion but a good size to go with the soup. The pizza bread was topped with tomato, rosemary and rock salt and the quality was definitely there.

I would highly recommend Rocca di Papa if you are in the South Kensington area. Great Italian food and they have a menu that they change with seasonal dishes. If you have space for dessert, then you have to try the amazing Oddonos ice cream! Rocca also have a heated outdoor seating area!

Rocca di Papa, 73 Old Brompton Road, South Kensington, London, SW7 3JS

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If you want some good Italian food, then you can never fail with Zizzi! It’s even better now that they have added some new items to their menu. One of the new additions is the pizzettes. These are three mini pizzas with the following toppings: tomato and pesto, cheese and caramelised onions, peppers and goat’s cheese. The pizzettes are definitely a winner of a starter!

The main dishes were also very flavoursome. The risotto verde was quite a big portion. It had a light fresh taste to it, mainly because of the fresh green vegetables. The risotto had lots of broad beans and large slices of courgettes. It didn’t really have much spinach or green beans.rn

The penne alla casa was a baked pasta dish with chicken, pancetta, spinach in a mushroom sauce. We were surprised at how oily and greasy this dish was; something that we would not have expected when referring to pasta. It still had a good taste to it though.

We went for the full three courses and had dessert to complete our meal. The sorbetti was specified on the menu as being two scoops of sorbet. It was nice that the waiter let me have one scoop of ice cream and one of sorbet. The flavours were all good!!! We had refreshing mango sorbet, creamy strawberry ice cream and my friend had the blackcurrant sorbet. She said that the blackcurrant one was quite sharp.

The biggest problem that we had this particular Zizzi was that the service was extremely slow. All in all, we were there for hours and that was due to us waiting so long for the attention of the staff and for our food to be served. It was not like the restaurant was that busy or that they were understaffed. It was a good job that we had the starter right at the beginning of the meal, otherwise we would have been totally starving by the time the rest of our food would have come.

Zizzi, O2 Centre, 255 Finchley Road, London, NW3 6LU

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This restaurant felt quite dark even though we were seated near the windows and we were there at lunchtime. The staff came and asked us a few times, quite frequently, if we were ready to order. But then after that, when we were actually ready to give our order, we had to wait quite a while to get the attention of the staff.

The basket of pesto and tomato pizza bread was really good. They were six big pieces. We could definitely taste the quality of the pesto that was used. I would not recommend having the pizza bread as a starter if you were going to have a pizza for the main meal, as they are very similar.rn

I chose to have the starter of the gnochhi instead of the main course. The portion was the more like a main dish so I wasn’t disappointed. The gnocchi came with cherry tomatoes, cheese and a tomato sauce. It was a nice alternative to pasta although I don’t think the dish really needed the cubes of cheese.

Originally, one of the dishes that we wanted to order was the green vegetable risotto. But then the waiter came and told us that they had run out of that. So the next best alternative was the pumpkin and butternut squash risotto. This risotto was really tasty and it also had wilted spinach and pine nuts. We had it made without the panchetta so that it was a vegetarian dish.

The other risotto that we got to taste was the seafood one. It was also a good choice and had plenty of fish in  it. A nice side dish was the rosemary roasted new potatoes. A small portion but enough to go with the main meal.

On this occasion, we could not have any hot drinks as both the hot water machine and the coffee machine was not working.

All in  all, I liked the food at Strada but felt that dining here would have been nicer if the decor was a little lighter.

Strada, 105-106 Upper Street, Islington, London, N1 1QN

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Situated in the lively Temple Bar area is Frankie Dettori’s and Marco Pierre White’s restaurant. This Italian restaurant was a little dark when we entered but I think that we got accustomed to the lighting.

The waiter recommended a pineapple and coconut non-alcoholic cocktail and this did not disappoint. It was quite a rich drink but a great start to the meal!rn

The aubergine parmigiana was a few slices of aubergine baked with cheese and a tomato sauce. The aubergine was sliced lengthways which meant that it was quite a tasty substantial meal. A great side dish was the spinach with chilli and garlic. The spinach was cooked perfectly and it was not spicy, which is what I preferred.

We made sure that we had room for dessert! The New York cheesecake was very fresh and it was big enough to for two people. The biscuit base was quite thick which made the cheesecake even more yummy! The tiramisu was presented in a martini glass and you could taste the quality ingredients.

The walls are decorated with cartoon like pictures of various people! The staff were really friendly and when we asked if we could have a different table to the one we were originally seated at, they happily let us move. They also didn’t rush us when it was closing time for the restaurant. The service was efficient and the staff knew the menu well!

Frankie’s Bar and Grill, 42 Temple Bar Square, Dublin 2,

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