Italian

There are countless Italian restaurants in Manchester but unless you like dining with footballers wives there aren’t that many good ones. In fact, I haven’t eaten at one since Italia early last year and that’s sadly no longer with us. I’d never visited a ‘Gusto’ before – a chain of Italian restaurants by Living Ventures with branches in cities including Liverpool and …

I recently broke one of my own self-imposed rules by accepting an invitation to the VIP opening night of Zizzi’s new Piccadilly restaurant. My stance on ‘freebies’ is that i’m happy to go to places i’d be likely to visit anyway, something I can’t honestly say about Zizzi who appear to epitomise everything I dislike about chains. In fact, I …

After attending two fabulous supper clubs recently my third had a lot to live up to. I had particularly high hopes for this one though as it was held by Franco Sotgiu owner of one of my favourite Manchester restaurants, SoLita. Never one to undersell himself Franco described the event in aid of Trussell Trust as “A Rather Special Italian …

I last visited Italia back in November whilst it was still in it’s ‘soft launch’ period after being rebranded under new management. I had a fantastic time that night with the only disappointment being a lack of interesting desserts, this was understandable as the restaurant had only been open a couple of weeks and the menu was still under development. …

As I admitted in the review of my last visit to Jamie’s Italian i’m a huge Jamie Oliver fan. I buy all his books, watch all of his shows and have had some great times in his various restaurants including Jamie’s Italian Manchester shortly after it opened. Unfortunately, this Christmas Eve I was reminded that Jamie’s Italian isn’t really a …

Most of my early dining out experiences were in Italian restaurants, whilst I love having access to so many other cuisines these days there will always be a little piece of me in love with Italian restaurants. There are already countless Italians in Manchester, though most of them seem to be soulless chains serving the same old mediocre food. With …

I’ve always considered Ramsons to be a bit of a ‘hidden gem’ although it really isn’t as it’s won countless awards. Just last year it was voted Restaurant of the Year in the 2012 Manchester Food & Drink Festival Awards as well as 43rd best restaurant in the country in The 2012 Good Food Guide who also gave their all Italian Wine list …

OK, cards on the table from the start: I LOVE Jamie Oliver. I have practically all of his books and I watch all his TV shows (well, all his cooking shows anyway, I just couldn’t bring myself to watch Jamie’s Dream School). I’d like to think it won’t have any impact on this review and i’m judging purely the food …