My favorite Italian restaurants in London
- anna
- Oct 25, 2018
- 4 min read
Updated: Oct 27, 2018
Being Italian, I think it could be useful to share my top 5 Italian restaurants in London
1- Sartori: 10/10
Food quality/ taste: 10/10
Price: 9/10 (~£40 pp for a starter, main and dessert with a glass of wine or ~£25 for pizza and beer)
Service: 9/10
Value for money: 10/10
Sartori is a must for Italians living in London and, when you enter the place you will realise it straight away from the percentage of Italians (probably ~99%!) eating there.
Sartori is a classical Neapolitan restaurant with a menu which includes a broad selection of starters, fish and meat mains, huge portions of pasta and a good wood-fired pizza. All of these options are of very good quality and very filling.
When we go there alone, with friends or with our parents (who really love Sartori) we usually order a sharing starter made of very tasty marinated vegetables (artichokes, mushrooms, pumpkin, olives, sauteed aubergines and much more) and then take a main each (pasta, fish or pizza).
Price wise Sartori has an excellent value for money for the quantity and taste of food. The only negative note (If we really want to find some negatives) it is that the place is a bit loud and busy, especially on weekends and service is sometimes a bit in a rush.
Overall, highly suggested!
2- Portobello Garden: 10/10
Food quality/ taste: 10/10
Price: 10/10 (~£30-35 pp for a starter, main and dessert with a glass of wine)
Service: 9/10
Value for money: 10/10
Portobello Garden is a quite new and stunning discovery. The place is not advertised that much and it is quite hidden, being at the end of Portobello Market, very close to Ladbroke Grove station.
The place is very cozy and really looks like a garden; it serves Neapolitan food, which is mostly comprised of bruschette, amazing paninis, salads and very tasty sharing boards of cold cuts or marinated vegetables. So less of a traditional restaurant if compared to Sartori, but equally good in my mind!
When we go there we usually order a sharing board (I really love the one with marinated vegetables and cheese) and a main each (my favorite is the buffalo mozzarella and friarielli bruschetta with truffle oil). Francesco usually gets the cannolo as a dessert, which he certifies as authentic Neapolitan, being him from close to Naples.
The good thing of this place it is that they are very friendly and usually they offer you (very very rare for London!) a big glass of amaro or limoncello to close dinner as it should :)
For a dinner like the above you will end up spending maximum 30£ with one or two glasses of wine, which is extremely cheap for London!
Once again, you should try not to miss this place as it is really good and cheap!
- Portobello: 8/10
Food quality/ taste: 10/10
Price: 7/10 (~£50+ pp for a starter, main and dessert with a glass of wine or ~£35 for pizza and beer)
Service: 9/10
Value for money: 8/10
Portobello is a quite known Italian place very close to Notting Hill station which serves southern italian food from traditional mains (mostly fish) to pizza by the meter.
The place is nice and a bit more upscale than the previous two, with a focus on seafood (both pasta and mains). The wood-fired pizza they serve is also pretty good, with very fresh ingredients.
We have been to Portobello several times and our choices varied, sometimes going for the pizza or sometimes, especially in my case, going for fish mains as grilled salmon or fish soup, which I remember being very good.
The only negative point of Portobello is that in my opinion it is a bit overpriced, having starters that go from £10-15, pasta dishes at an average of £15 and seafood mains at £20+.
Overall it is a good choice and you will not regret eating there, but the bill will be a bit undigested :)
4- Casa Tua: 8/10
Food quality/ taste: 9/10
Price: 8/10 (~£40 pp for a starter, main and dessert with a glass of wine)
Service: 8/10
Value for money: 8/10
I discovered Casa Tua from an Italian TV show where Italians leaving abroad suggest their favourite restaurant in the city where they live (in this case London). They have 2 branches one in Kings Cross (where I went) and another one in Camden.
The place is very cozy and has a short selection of starters and mains from Puglia. They are mostly known for pasta (especially the broccoli and tarallo crumbs orecchiette).
We have been there only once and we got two starters to share (tomato and pesto bruschetta and caponata) and one main each (I got a very good octopus in a rich tomato sauce and Francesco got their signature orecchiette with broccoli and tarallo crumbs). Everything was tasty and of good quality.
Price wise it is affordable, I could say ~£40 p.p. for the above dinner with a glass of wine and a dessert to share (in this case not to share and Francesco eat that!).
Overall a good option to try and I will bring my parents to this place next week again!
5 - Luce e Limoni: 8/10
Food quality/ taste: 9/10
Price: 7.5/10 (~£50 pp for a starter, main and dessert with a glass of wine)
Service: 7.5/10
Value for money: 7.5/10
Luce e Limoni is a Sicilian seafood restaurant, which is a bit hidden (close to Chancery Lane station), in a place mostly for offices close to the City.
We have been to this place two times and I have to say that the quality and taste of food is very good and the fish is very well cooked based on traditional Sicilian recipes.
You can choose among a quite varied selection of seafood starters (the last time we got a backed mackerel flan with a roasted pepper sauce and wind dried tuna with artichokes) and mains as pasta or fish (the last time I got a tuna steak which was very tender).
Whist food is very good (even though I think portions could be a bit bigger for the price charged), I find the wine list not aligned at all with the restaurant's positioning as It does not have a wine which is cheaper than £35 and this is a bit too much for a restaurants that is good, but is not fine dining.
The average spend for a dinner with a starter, a main and dessert each with a glass of wine is around £50, in line with London average.
All in all, I think that Luce e Limoni is a good place where to eat seafood in London, but there a few things that could be adjusted to make it even better!
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