b! Review: Little Italy @ Hinjewadi | Food | Know your city

Just hearing the words Little Italy can visually transport you to the beautiful Italian countryside. Right on cue, Husein Upletawala says the fare here lives up to the dream.

Even upon entering, the quaintness is intact; giving no hint of the massive 240 covers this two level restaurant can pack-in. This includes a banquet and alfresco area which is shut during the monsoons.

The menu covers a huge variety of antipasti, soups, salads, pizzas, pastas, risottos, desserts and drinks. If that wasn?t enough, they?ve also got a selection of Mediterranean and Mexican dishes like hummus, falafel, quesadillas and nachos. This felt like an almost desperate attempt by the management to cater to varied tastes akin to the Indian-Chinese-Thai restaurants that were the rage long back before speciality restaurants made their mark.

The first choice you?ve to make here is to either read the entire menu or eat something before your stomach decides to announce itself. That?s how humungous and often repetitive the menu is. Which was a pity because after a while we just skimmed through the menu ordering only what caught our eyes and surely in the process missed out a few dishes we?d have liked to order.

We started off with the Funghi Trifolati (Rs 240), mushrooms with herbs and garlic, served with garlic bread and the Special Crostini (Rs 300), farmer?s bread, grilled and topped with exotic vegetables.

The mushrooms were well-cooked retaining their shape and bite but the bread looked and tasted suspiciously like pav-bhaji bread. Italian pav-bhaji, anyone? The Special Crostini were a dozen pieces of bit sized grilled morsels of bread topped with red and yellow peppers, zucchini, aubergines and sun-dried tomatoes and cheese. Definitely a better option than the mushrooms with a good play on varied textures and flavours and good value for money as well.

For mains, we ordered the Pizza Napoli (Rs 435), wood-fired pizza topped with green peppers, jalapenos, onion and sun-dried tomatoes and the Pasta Barbaresca with Gnocchi (Rs385) ? broccoli, sun-dried tomatoes, parsley, garlic, chilli pepper, and parmesan.

The Risotto Al Funghi Porcine Rs 350 was a fun combination of imported porcini mushrooms, cream and parmesan sauce. The pizza was the dish of the day. This one had pungency from the jalapenos, crunchy onions and peppers and tangy sun-dried tomatoes ? this dish alone warrants a revisit. Also commendable was the pizza bread which wasn?t all crispy like papad but thin and soft with a crisp edge. The Gnocchi was soft and chewy but the combination with the Barbaresca didn?t really work. We thought a penne or fusilli may have been better. The risotto scored maximum points with us with earthy brown rice, savoury mushrooms and a cheese sauce, although a few more of those mushrooms would have added more texture to the dish.

Now, a great Tiramisu needs to have mascarpone cheese, else we?d be happy to discount it as Tiramisu all together. Committing a sin that could drive at least half of Italian cuisine?s purists to jump off the Gran Paradiso, Little Italy does two versions of the dessert ? with and without the cheese ? presumably to offer a less expensive option. Unfortunately, the restaurant was out of Tiramisu Italiano, so we settled for the Tiramisu (Rs 190), which has vanilla cream custard instead. This one was as awesome as being served Biryani made with egg-noodles instead of Basmati rice.

That said, we loved the Chocolate Bomb (Rs 200) which was a warm chocolate cake with molten chocolate ganache at its heart. Served with vanilla ice-cream, consider yourself warned as chocoholics will want repeat orders.

The service was quick and efficient though they did struggle a bit when asked for suggestions, an issue we expect to be ironed-out as the staff becomes familiar with the menu and what?s popular.

Apart from a la carte menu, the restaurant also offers lunch buffets on all days of the week. No liquor license yet, which was disappointing because a good Chardonnay tastes infinitely better with risotto than orange juice.

Verdict: It?s a tad pricey, but should become extremely popular with the IT crowd and their lunch buffet is good value for money.

Must try: Wood-fired Pizzas and the Chocolate Bomb.

Price for two:?Rs 1500+taxes (without alcohol)

Source: http://know.burrp.com/food-dining/b-review-little-italy-hinjewadi/43501

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