City, Italian Restaurant Guide

This 55-year-old City trattoria is a popular, lunchtime rendezvous spot on account of its “huge” helpings of classic dishes; its terrace by Bow churchyard for al fresco eating; and its good regional list of Italian wines.

The Chelsea branch of this modern Italian duo (the other is in The City) “was a real godsend during the Covid restrictions” for its “special terrace” – “one of the best in London” – “well away from the King’s Road traffic” and with “lots of flowers and heaters when needed”. “The food is very good but rather pricey” – perhaps as expected at these locations.

A “family-run trattoria” three minutes’ walk from St Paul’s that rates highly for its “varied Italian menu” – and it’s notably well priced for the City, too.

“Small plates but big flavours” from “a lovely short menu of top-quality antipasti and pasta dishes” win numerous “cheap ’n’ cheerful” nominations for this small chain, which consists of the “busy, lovely but very crammed” Soho original (for 75 years a deli, but since 2018 and its relaunch by Private Equity firm White Rabbit, in this new guise) and a newer, bigger but less commented-on King’s Cross spin-off. “We need more branches of this great restaurant” plead fans… whose prayers are soon to be answered with a 90-seater outlet in Marylebone (in Wigmore Street, on the former Sourced Market site) plus in Bloomberg Arcade and Clapham, as well as one in Tokyo!