Salmon Tagliatelle

A wander round town in search of dinner for under a tenner revealed very few choices. Not more than a hundred yards from where all of the students live in the Polygon, I stumbled upon a small Italian restaurant with a slightly garish exterior but neatly finished and surprisingly welcoming interior.

I was greeted by a very enthusiastic Italian restaurateur who managed to squeeze us in to what was a completely deserted room with about fifty covers. This was slightly unnerving as it was just after seven on a Friday night but we persevered.

After a quick scan of the menu, I found a substantial number of dishes in my price bracket. I was starving so I was very grateful when a complimentary bread roll and delicious olives were placed in front of me. Sadly, the bread was a tad dry and could have benefited from a few minutes warming in the oven.

I was not waiting long (although, the noisy drinks fridge was starting to bug me) before my Salmon Tagliatelle arrived before me. I very much enjoyed the first half of the meal before the richness of the cream sauce overwhelmed my palate and I became very full, very quickly and struggled to finish.

My total bill came to £13 which included a bottle of Peroni at £3 which I was very satisfied with seeing as most of the other restaurants along Southampton’s main street would have cost substantially more.

Food: 6.5/10
Service: 6.5/10
Atmosphere: 5.5/10
Value: 8/10
Overall: 6.6/10

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Rustica Pizza with Parma Ham, Rocket and Tomato

Rustica Pizza with Parma Ham and Rocket

A cheeky weekend trip to Bristol was enhanced by an excellent evening meal at Zizzi, a popular Italian chain of restaurants in the UK.

The restaurants appearance was typically chic with dark wooden furniture, dimmed lighting and perfectly laid out tableware. An incredible, fiery masonry oven towered over the open kitchen, ensuring in my mind that the pizzas would be of a high quality. I was not proved wrong.

The menu featured classic Italian dishes with an abundance of olives, breads, pastas and pizzas.

We began our meal with a selection of mixed olives which were delicious. More interestingly however, was the unique, little, wooden bowl the olives arrived in. It had a main bowl for the olives and a smaller bowl attached to the side to leave the olive stones in. I don’t know why we were only given two toothpicks when there were clearly four of us though.

Calzone with Chicken, Meatballs, Bolognese, Mushrooms, Chilli, Mozzarella and Tomato

Calzone with Chicken and Meatballs

Two ordered the newly featured ‘Rustica’ pizzas which are supposedly thinner, crispier and loaded with more toppings. Myself and another chose to have the calzone, ‘carne piccante’, which contained chicken, meatballs, bolognese, mushrooms, chilli, mozzarella and tomato.

The calzone was spectacular. It was great to find that the dough was crisp and full of flavour because it can sometimes be very dry and bland. The filling was tasty and packed with different herbs and spices. I do feel however that the chefs were a little bit stingy with the meats and a little bit too generous with the chillies. I found myself searching for the one piece of chicken I was given for the entire course of the meal and my final mouthful was ruined by an overload of chilli. This was unfortunate as I did not have much Sicilian lemonade left to help calm my flaming mouth.

Overall, the meal was very good value because we were able to claim a promotional code from VoucherCodes.co.uk which gave us 2 mains for £12.95. I thoroughly enjoyed my time at the restaurant which was definitely a highlight of my Bristol adventure.