Manchester Restaurant Review – Piccolino Manchester #FreedomFriday

I have discussed before that I am retired and my husband now only works part – time. That means we have every Friday free – our weekend starts early! Yippee!

I refer to these days as #FreedomFriday

We try to spend quality time together. I like to share some of the activities we do and places we visit. Last Friday was a day into Manchester for drinks and food. We visited a couple of bars – which I will discuss in later posts about favourite bars in Manchester.

We chose to eat in Piccolino’s – Clarence Street just off AlbertSquare.

• Name of venue visited

Piccolino’s

• Reason for visit

Early dinner with husband

• Time and day of visit

Friday 5pm -no prior booking

• First impression
• Greeted and seated immediately. Has been updated since our last visit. Lovely  vibe straight away, lively hum of chatter and activity. Love the cool blue leather, oak fittings and chandeliers. It looks much more than your average pizzeria.

  

  Sorry its a bit blurred!

• Time to get servers attention/service

Met at the door by friendly staff – immediate attention.

• Food quality

 

The food was delicious -We had garlic bread and olives for starters. For mains John chose the Linguine al gamberetti  – King Prawns, courgettes and chilli, he tends to chose a shellfish linguine. He thought this was one of the better ones he’s eaten.

I chose one of the seasonal specials – Pumpkin Risotto – I’d never eaten pumpkin before so wasn’t sure what to expect. It was lovely – the risotto was fabulous – creamy and perfect consistency. Again I eat a lot of risotto’s and this was one of the better ones.

We rarely eat desserts but we did on this occasions Afogata for John – a favourite for both of us – I ate a pear in chocolate sauce – Mmmmm- divine.

For drinks John had Moretti and a glass of Red Wine (house) for me.

• Quality of Service

Service was prompt and business like. Not too many pleasantries exchanged. When the bill was presented it was £83 -on closer inspection there was 3 rounds of drinks on the bill that weren’t ours – a Negroni, a glass of Prosecco and an Aperol Spritz. I pointed this out and it was amended – did need two attempts though – the Aperol Spritz was still showing the second time. Again this was amended with no quibble. The new total was just a little over £54. Reasonable for the quality of food and surroundings.

• Evaluation

Really pleasing visit. In fact I think this our new favourite Italian Restaurant.                   Would be suitable just to visit for a drink or cocktail

• Would I visit again?

Yes, definitely.

Sample menu http://www.individualrestaurants.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Manchester-PICC-With-Fish-Platter-AW-2016-1.pdf

If you’ve visited one of the Piccolino Restaurants – was your experience as good?

What’s your favourite choice in an Italian Restaurant.

 

Please comment or contact me via earlyretirementrocks@gmail.com