Recently in London I went out for a meal at Ciao Bella in Bloomsbury.
It was rather a crowded noisy typical Italian restaurant that you can find in London and in other cities across the UK. You are when choosing what to eat faced with a typically large varied menu covering a range of Italian cuisine including pizza and pasta.
From personal experience in northern Italy these kinds of restaurants don’t seem to actually exist in Italy. In Italy there are small family run places have smaller menus, fresh food, ever changing and delicious food.
I have been put off going to Italian restaurants in the UK in the main as I have had a couple of bad experiences. I was once at another Italian restaurant in London and I asked for Spaghetti alle Vongole, and what I got was a sauce that was from a jar!
So I glanced over the menu with a little trepidation, knowing that though it might sound nice on the menu, it may not actually be nice. In the end I went with one of my usual choices, the calamari fritti. Regular readers of the blog will know that I am a real fan of squid and it’s almost a benchmark for me on how good a restaurant is. Squid is a relatively simple dish to cook and if a place can’t cook squid properly than what hope is there for any other dish from the place.
It was a good sized portion and despite the dusting of paprika was very nice. It wasn’t rubbery and tasted good. It wasn’t perfect, but I have had a lot worse before.