A long established and popular restaurant on the main road through the village, it’s quite a good size internally and also benefits from a conservatory at the front which is a pleasant spot, although with the windows open during the recent hot weather there was...quite a lot of noise from the road. Parking is rather limited in comparison to the size of the restaurant, and a number of diners had to park on the narrow lane at the back.
The menu offers a comprehensive selection of pizza and pasta dishes, as well as several other options. We started with some nibbles from the specials board which were olives stuffed with meat and fried in breadcrumbs. They were ok, not quite as tasty as I was expecting perhaps, but pleasant enough to chew on. I wanted to leave room for desert and so dived straight in to a main course of a classic Spaghetti Carbonara. This was very good, not overly creamy as can sometimes be the case, and plenty of bacon in there as well. Across the table, the Spaghetti Polpette with meatballs in a rich tomato sauce was slightly less successful perhaps, with the meatballs having a rather pronounced flavour that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, fennel perhaps? The tomato sauce was decent and rich though.
A desert of Amaretto Tiramisu was a bit of a twist on the classic, and liking both Amaretto and Tiramisu that was one I had to try, and I wasn’t disappointed. Quite a subtle Amaretto flavour, but a very good dish overall. Again, the Strawberry Cheesecake across the table was perhaps not quite as good, I’m not sure if they’re previously frozen or bought in, but the texture definitely reminded me of something I’ve bought in the supermarket, and the strawberries on top certainly did not appear fresh. Nothing at all wrong with it, but not quite as good as it could have been.
Overall, I was very impressed with this, despite a few minor niggles with some of the dishes. The staff were all friendly, most of the food at least was very good, and the prices were reasonable. It also makes a pleasant change to not only have no service charge added on, but not even the option to add one, as the waiter just tapped my card on his machine.More