Sunday 3 October 2010

Overated

Oh how one yearns for the days of yore, when one could get together with friends in a restaurant and linger over a meal! Today's requirement for two sittings means that one feels rather hurried and anxious, a feeling exacerbated by waiting staff who "need that table by 9.30".

A lot has been written about Trullo's good value for money (small mark-ups on wine, ungreedy pricing) and it's exceptional 'River Cafe' style food. I'm afraid that we found it rather uninspiring.
A promising start to the evening when we shared an excellent bottle of prosecco in this unpretentious and pleasant room, served by a charming and attractive waitress, gave way to disappointment with both the food and service. We ordered a mixture of antipasti and starters, but the waitress got confused and brought us four dishes but not my pasta dish. When this finally came, it was the wrong dish and had to be changed. Our main courses all came together, but none of us were particularly smitten with them.

I had a fresh tagliatelle with chanterelles - the fungi flavour all but masked by the heavy butter and parmesan sauce. This was followed by a veal T-bone overcharred on the grill which meant it just tasted burnt, seved with a quite nice mixture of what I think was red cabbage and potatoes.
Su and I shared a cheese plate which was fine, but served unaccountedly with two quite horrible and inedible grissini - we had to ask for some bread!
The bottles of Gavi and Sicilian Donnafugata were lovely, as was the pudding wine.

I'm afraid the perennial affliction of so many restaurants sadly applies - namely poorly trained service staff (this despite the presence of a young man who was previously, and improbably, front of house at River Cafe). On our visit, the much-trumpeted 'fresh, good quality ingredients simply served' left us sincerely underwhelmed, and in one instance (the salmoriglio sauce with plaice) seriously faulty.

One gives a mark for the overall experience, and I'm sorry but it's a 4/10.

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