The Observer
Tony Naylor ate among the hip young things of Sheffield in a new city-centre Sicilian spot from restaurateur Jack Wakelin and chef Tom Aronica, the team behind Bench, Pearl at Park Hill and Bench La Cave.
This is no bland high-street trat, he said. “Instead, Sicilian food becomes a pedal-to-the-metal, amps-at-11, sensory assault of flavour and seasoning that, if you know anyone living on black coffee and 40 cigs-a-day, will enable them to taste again. Hallelujah!”
The kitchen can be subtle when required, as in arancini filled with a “clean, lightly briny cuttlefish ragout”, but most of the dishes were “rich, in-your-face and almost LOL-clever”, from grilled and marinated courgettes of an “almost Thai-style complexity”, via pappardelle with mutton, artichokes and ricotta salata bursting with “umami oomph”, to a perfectly cooked whole seabass. “After two-plus hours, I was done, stuffed, punch-drunk on flavour.”
Tony Naylor - 2026-06-28
