La Famiglia

Food ✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪ 

80 Queen Street 
Amble 
Northumberland 
NE65 0DD 

01665 711 862 

www.boathousefoodgroup.co.uk/la-famiglia 

Among the restaurant-going public it’s a longstanding belief that the words “home-made”, or any variation thereof, denote something good. Maybe that’s why they appear so frequently on menus. The sauce is always the “chef’s own”. Or the soup is “our chef's special recipe”. Yum.

At La Famiglia, in Amble, all the pasta is “handmade on the premises”. What then to make of the fact that, at least on the cheerily bright lunchtime of our visit, it wasn’t very good?

Stable Hearth

Food ✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪✪ 

33-35 Duke Street 
Darlington 
DL3 7RX 

01325 730 400

Accessibility: No
Gluten Free?: Yes
www.stablehearth.com 

Strange things, food trends. How do they happen? 

Take Balsamic vinegar, for example, which has been around since at least the Middle Ages. However Britain was largely untroubled by it until the 1990s when all of a sudden it - or at least a product that imitates the real stuff - was dribbled over just about everything we cooked. Why? Was it Ready Steady Cook’s fault?

Lollo Rosso

Food ✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪

40 Bridge Street 
Morpeth 
Northumberland 
NE61 1NL 

01670 514 111 
Accessibility? Yes 
Gluten free? Yes 
www.lollorossoitalia.co.uk

When we were kids, any birthday, holiday or high day tended to mean one thing: a trip to the local Italian restaurant. Always the same one, with the same waiters, same food, same everything. My family didn’t eat out that much so our very being there was in itself an exciting treat. 

I’m sure you know the sort of place I’m on about: red table cloths, pepper grinders as long as your arm, spoonfuls of pre-grated “parmesan” offered with everything, pizzas with dubious toppings (my uncle always got the Bolognese, a plain cheese pizza with a fair sized hillock of meat ragu plopped on top), tricolour candles poked into chianti bottles. 

Obviously the food was never that great, but it tasted fabulous to us at the time, because it was different to what we had at home. I loved that I could order from a proper grown-up menu, and I can still recall that heady waft of garlic fumes as we walked through the door. 

Best of all, I loved that we were welcomed like long lost royalty. The staff - all chaps back then of course - seemed ridiculously busy, but always had enough time to make a fuss over us kids and flirt outrageously with Mum before delivering armloads of pizza to the next table. And best of all, I loved the sick nervous thrill of going on my birthday, knowing that at some point the restaurant would be silenced by the ringing of a massive bell, I’d be hoisted up to stand on my chair and the whole place would sing me a hearty happy birthday. 

The genius of Italian restaurants like this is that the whole family eats as one. This was how the diners of tomorrow learnt the essential grammar of eating out. Lollo Rosso in Morpeth is exactly that kind of place too: the ultimate family restaurant. Except that the food’s rather better than I remember our local Italian.

Marco Polo

Food ✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪ 

33 Dean Street 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE1 1PQ 

0191 232 5533 
Accessibility: Yes
Gluten Free?:  Yes
www.marcopolonewcastle.com 

“Very good, slightly better than 20/20,” said the brisk chap at my opticians, as I tried on my new bi-focals. 

As someone not in the habit of receiving praise from health professionals, this verdict came as a very happy surprise. Better than 20/20? That, as far as I was concerned, was practically a super power. I walked out feeling on top of the world, making a point of having a damn proper look at everything with my turbo-powered eye-glasses and fully expecting to get the call from Charles Xavier any minute. And then I sort of forgot all about it and got on with life, as you do. Until a couple of weeks ago. 

“Christ, what font is that? I can’t read the bloody thing at all,” said my friend. 

“Can’t be more than 7 point,” agreed Mrs Diner. “This is hopeless.” 

Four of us were sat in Marco Polo, but while the other three hunted out their reading specs and switched on their iPhone torches to see better, I alone was able to make out the bill of fare.

Seriously: whatever possessed them to squeeze every dish, wine, soft drink, cocktail and coffee they serve, not to mention their contact details, tips policy and mission statement all onto one place-setting sized piece of paper is anyone’s guess. Maybe it results in people ordering at random, which is good for stock rotation. Or perhaps the owners have a long-standing grudge against the visually challenged. Who knows.

Pizza Express

Food (according to them) ✪✪✪✪✪ 
Food (according to me) barely ✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪ 

7 St George’s Way 
Eldon Square Shopping Centre 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE1 7JD 

0191 232 3228 

www.pizzaexpress.com 
Accessibility? Yes 
Gluten free? Yes 

Full list of branches in our region here

I don’t recall ever having started a review by saying you should pretty much ignore my verdict. Call this page a special “collectors edition” if you like, but the opinions that really matter aren’t mine: they belong to the two Junior Diners we took to lunch. 

You see, it’s the summer holidays which, if you’re young enough still to be on the receiving end of a school education, stretch out in front of you like a delightful dream. For parents, however, it’s a never-ending dilemma of how to keep kids amused. Apart from developing urchins into citizens and all that jazz, the real purpose of school is to provide free childcare. When it stops, your world is turned upside down, and anything that the whole family can enjoy together suddenly become wildly valuable. So, having been entrusted with Mrs Diner’s London-based nieces, aged 10 and 5, for an afternoon in the city centre, they enthusiastically accepted the suggestion of a trip to PizzaExpress.

Zucchini Pasta Bar

Food ✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪ 

55 Degrees North 
Pilgrim Street 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE1 6BL 

07921 919798 
www.zucchinipastabar.co 
Accessibility? Yes 
Gluten free? Yes

Another week, and another gaping hole in Newcastle’s food scene is plugged, this time by a modest new restaurant run by people who really deserve our custom. 

There have always been plenty of places to get bowls of pasta in town, but many of them come accompanied by The Godfather theme and illuminated by flickering tricolour candles stuffed into empty chianti bottles. There’s a time and a place for that sort of thing - birthday meals in the 1980’s, mostly - but for those of us who prefer our carbs served with a little less cliché, I bring good news. Newcastle now has its own fresh pasta bar.

Little Italy [CLOSED]

Food ✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪ 

Unit 12-13 
Grainger Market 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE1 5QG 

07783 858 033 
www.facebook.com/abrootsolimited 
Accessibility? Yes
Gluten free? Yes 

[Oh no - I see Little Italy is closed and shuttered (see picture below).  Here, for the memory, is my review from 2017].

I remember a time, and perhaps you do too, when the Grainger Market was far from being a gastronaut’s delight. Now it’s an essential destination on Newcastle’s foodie map. When Mmm… opened in 2008, selling posh olive oils and precociously tasty condiments, I feared that they were too far ahead of the curve and would never last. As it turns out, I was bang wrong and they were in fact just the vanguard of a whole brigade of food start-ups that would take advantage of the central location and reasonable rents offered by this fabulous Regency-era covered market. 

A couple of years ago I reviewed many of the excellent street-food vendors who have made the place their home, but recently I felt had to return just to check out what I reckon is probably the market’s first fully fledged restaurant - plates, wine, proper service, that sort of thing. I’d heard that simple Italian food was being done very well. I’d heard right.

Lollo Rosso

Food ✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪✪ 

61 Bridge Street 
Morpeth 
Northumberland 
NE61 1PQ 

01670 514111 
http://www.lollorossoitalia.co.uk 

In the nineties and noughties, The Ivy in London was every major celebrity’s favourite haunt. It wasn’t the food that made it so popular (the cooking has never been that special), its success was down to the extraordinarily warm atmosphere generated by its two restaurateurs Jeremy King and Chris Corbin, and their charming maître d’ Fernando Peire. From Beckham to Biggins to you and me, everyone was always made to feel at home. 

The ability to make strangers feel like guests or even friends is an essential and priceless gift for any restaurateur. And that’s what Giovanni Marabini has in abundance. 

OK, so let’s admit it – Morpeth has never had a lot going for it, restaurant-wise. As Newcastle has transformed its culinary reputation over the past five years, this pretty market town has remained a backwater of indifferent dining. Aside from Nadon Thai, which produces some quality Asian dishes, I reserved one shiny star (well, four, actually) for Marabini's, then a modest Italian above a shop in New Market. A modest Italian with a terrific atmosphere.

A couple of years ago Giovanni fell out with his business partner, so Marabini’s was no more and the town mourned. Happily, Giovanni (and his Cuban partner Miguel Perez) landed round the corner in Bridge Street with Lollo Rosso. Readers have been urging me to visit for ages. I’m sorry I waited so long.

Al Buco (CLOSED)

Food ✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪✪ 

4 Eldon Square 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE1 7JG 

0191 261 6646
facebook.com/albuconcl 
Accessibility? No 
Gluten free? Yes 

On a wet early winter afternoon, as the Christmas shoppers were turning their collars up in defiance of the elements, Old Eldon Square could hardly have felt less Italian. And yet, down just a few steps, and with one greedy forkful of pasta, I was whisked straight off to Bari, deep in the warmth of Italy’s heel. Such is the magic of good food.

Cal's Own

Food ✪✪✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 

1-2 Holly Avenue West
Jesmond 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE2 2AR 

0191 281 5522 
www.calsown.co.uk 
Accessibility: Yes
Gluten free?: Yes

[STOP PRESS: On 2nd May 2017 Cal's Own received final notification that it had been admitted to the world's most exclusive pizzeria club - the Verace Pizza Napoletana Association.  There is only one other UK member, A Casa Mia in Herne Bay, Kent.  The notification came after a lengthy and rigorous vetting process by the Naples committee, which verified his methods and ingredients.  This means that Cal's margherita pizza really is as good as the best you can find in Naples - and almost certainly one of the two best versions of the margherita in the UK.]   

Usually I go, eat, write the truth as I taste it, and that’s about it. My job is simply to judge each restaurant on a single meal, just as any customer would. 

Sometimes the owners and chefs are happy with what I write, and sometimes they are upset, but the world continues to turn and, as Del Amitri said, the needle returns to the start of the song. 

However some of my reviews, I confess, come with a side order of apprehension. These are the places which, privately, I really wanted to be good, because I know the story behind the menu, about the sweat and tears that have been invested by an owner or chef committed to perfection. But you can’t review a chef’s dream, you can only report the reality. So you just sit at your table, pick a few dishes, and hope for the best. 

Cal’s Own falls squarely into this latter category.  Here is someone who is not just fanatical about what he’s doing, he has committed his life acquiring the knowledge and skills to create a product that’s up with the very best in the world. That’s a tall order, when that product is as ubiquitous as pizza.

Rossopomodoro

Food ✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪ 

1st Floor John Lewis 
Eldon Square 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE99 1AB 

0191 261 1287 
www.rossopomodoro.co.uk 

Mon-Fri 9am-8pm 
Sat 9am-7pm 
Sun 11am-5pm 

“From the South of Italy to the North of England…You’ll find us on the first floor of John Lewis.” What is with Newcastle’s department stores? Fenwick and John Lewis appear to have challenged each other to an all-out restaurant war. 

While Fenwick brought in the local big guns - Terry Laybourne and his team helped create a really snazzy food hall with some great eateries, including a fishmonger and seafood bar, an Asian noodle restaurant, and an excellent Mediterranean joint called Fuego — John Lewis turned to Rossopomodoro.

Fratello's

Food ✪ 
Service ✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪ 

Doubletree by Hilton Hotel 
Newcastle Airport 
NE13 8BZ 

01661 867020 
www.fratellosrestaurants.co.uk 



What a difference one letter can make. 

Fratello, which means ‘brother’, is a group of three Italian restaurants housed within hotels managed by Newcastle-based Cairn Group. Fratelli, which means ‘brothers’, is also one of three restaurants, but in this case the brothers are from Sardinia: Fabrizio Saba and his brother-in-law Paul Bernardelli, who have been running Sabatini, Prima and Fratelli for many years. 

If I were Signori Saba and Bernardelli, I’d have been pretty upset when Fratello’s opened at the airport, right on Fratelli’s doorstep. After all, they’d already successfully built up their popular Ponteland Italian and the locals seem to love it. Fratelli won Best Family Restaurant in the Secret Diner Restaurant Awards last year – they have a table magician at Sunday lunch. 

To have another Italian brother infiltrate their catchment area ought to have kickstarted a new Godfather movie. But aside from the name, they’re as different as chalk and cheese, or, in this case, cheap catering mozzarella and spicy soft Pecorino. One calls itself an Italian restaurant; the other actually is one.

Rosa Twelve

Food ✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 

580 Durham Road 
Low Fell 
Gateshead 
Tyne & Wear 
NE9 6HX 

 0191 487 8257 
www.rosa12.com 

Mon-Fri 11am-2.30pm, 5pm-10pm 
Sat 11am-10pm Sun noon-8pm 

Accessibility:  Downstairs only (full menu)

This place started out life as a little coffee shop called the Lugano. Then in the 1970s it became Restaurant Italia, a North East institution that just about kept itself alive until the end of 2012. 

By then a weary lasagna-and-minestrone joint, with red carpets, chairs and tablecloths, green and brown patterned wallpaper and wooden ceilings with fake fishing nets, the Italia was the sort of place that should have been humanely put to sleep in the 90s, but had somehow managed to survive through the loyal support of an ageing clientele, comforted by a familiar, unchallenging menu and low prices. 

Thankfully, Italian food in Britain has moved on since then. Step forward Rosa Twelve.

Cena Trattoria

Food ✪✪✪ 

Service ✪✪✪✪✪ 

Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 

85 The High Street 

Yarm 

TS15 9BG 

01642 780088 

www.cenayarm.com 

 Mon-Sat 12 noon - late 

Yarm is a town that wants to move. It’s been part of Stockton-on-Tees since the 70s, but earlier this year 1,465 residents voted to move it into North Yorkshire – that’s 89% of those who voted. 

A principle cause of discontent is the parking. Yarm, which is as attractive as most Yorkshire market towns, has very nice shops and cafés in a lovely Georgian High Street, down the centre of which is a marketplace that doubles as a car park. 

I tend to measure parking time in courses. If you want a starter and dessert you need at least an hour and a half. Parking here used to be free for the first two hours, allowing enough time for coffee and petit fours, but back in April Stockton Borough Council imposed charges – the first hour is free, but after that it costs £1. No wonder the locals are complaining: Cena, which sits right in the centre, has excellent pannetone bread and butter pudding.

Café Lilli

Food ✪✪✪✪✪ 

Service ✪✪✪✪ 

Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 

83-85 High Street 

Norton 

Stockton-on-Tees 

TS20 1AE 

01642 554422 

www.lillicafe.co.uk 

Closed Mondays 

Tues-Sat 11am-11pm 

Jazz Sundays: 

1st Sunday of the month, 2-6pm 

Norton village, in Stockton-on-Tees, is a pleasant surprise. 

It’s a bit like a rural market town, with a duckpond, village green, Victorian memorial cross, pretty almshouses and a long wide tree-lined high street – a contrast to sprawling Stockton and the stark industrial Teesside landscape surrounding it. 

It almost has the feel of a French village, with its shaded villas and rows of cars parked either side. Maybe that’s why the owners of Café Lilli chose this spot to open what is a very continental café. 

Jamie's Italian [CLOSED]

Food ✪✪✪ 
Service ✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪✪✪ 

Unit 3 
Monument Mall 
Newcastle upon Tyne 
NE1 7AL 

0191 500 0858 
www.jamieoliver.com/italian 

Mon – Sat: 12-11pm 
Sun: 12-10.30pm 

Accessibility – Yes 

With his culinary apprenticeship in London’s River Café, it was almost inevitable that Jamie Oliver would choose Italian food for his assault on the mass market. What’s surprised me is how long he’s taken build a branch of his theme park in Newcastle.

Cal's Own [NOW RELOCATED TO JESMOND]

Food ✪✪✪✪ 

Service ✪✪✪✪ 

Ambience ✪✪ 

207 Chillingham Road 

Heaton 

Newcastle Upon Tyne 

NE6 5LJ 

0191 276 5298 

www.calsown.co.uk 

Sun, Tues-Thurs 5-9.30pm 

Fri-Sat 11.30am-9.30pm 

Closed Monday, last orders 9pm 

Accessibility: Yes 

[This restaurant has now relocated to Jesmond.  See new review and rating here]
 
Cal is Calvin, a 29 year old pizza fanatic who used to work as a joiner, but just couldn’t understand why there wasn’t a decent pizzeria in Newcastle. Now before you start writing in, I want to make it clear that this was Cal’s view, and he has strong opinions about pizza.

So just over a year ago he gave up the woodwork and opened his own pizza shop called Cal’s Own – Calzone, geddit?

Milan

Food ✪✪ 

Service ✪✪✪✪ 

Ambience ✪✪✪✪ 

2 High Street 

Wooler 

NE71 6BY 

01668 283692 

www.milan-restaurant.co.uk 

5 – 10pm daily 

Accessibility: Yes 

How about dinner in Milan this weekend? 

Mrs Diner dropped her copy of The Journal in surprise. Then a look of ‘what will I wear?’ panic – until she caught the twinkle in my eye. I ducked as the newspaper flew past my nose. 

“OK, it’s in Wooler,” I said, “but I’m told it’s good – well, perhaps not like Cracco’s in Milan proper, but Adrian Gill reckons it’s OK.” 

In 2010 The Sunday Times critic wrote a patronising review that you can’t avoid when you walk through the arch of the Black Bull pub leading to its glass entrance in what used to be the stables. The review is proudly laminated to the walls, which is strange, considering it largely consists of condescending insults to the good people of Wooler. 

Vercelli

Food ✪✪✪✪*
Service ✪✪✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪ 

36-38 Priestpopple 
Hexham 
NE46 1PQ 
01434 603350 
www.vercelli.co.uk 

Accessibility: Yes 

Mon-Thu 12 - 2pm and 5.30 - 9pm 
Fri - Sat 12 - 2pm and 5.30 - 9.30pm 

[*WARNING: Change of chef since review - awaiting re-review]

We didn’t plan to visit Vercelli at all. We were in Hexham to try The Thai House, situated right next door, which had been recommended by several of my Twitter followers, but it was unexpectedly closed. 

Looking at the menu, Vercelli looks like one of those predictable lasagne and pizza joints you get all over the region, the kind of place I’ve criticised severely in the past, upsetting locals and management in the process. When will they learn that Italian cooking has moved on since the 1970s? 

However, I couldn’t have been more wrong. This restaurant is a gem.

Carluccio's

Food ✪✪ 
Ambience ✪✪✪ 
Service ✪ 

89 Grey Street 
Newcastle 
NE1 6EG 
0191 230 2148 

www.carluccios.com 

Mon to Sat: 8am - 11pm 
Sun: 9am - 10.30pm 

Carluccio’s empire has finally reached the desolate North East. 

Newcastle must be the last city in the land to get a branch of this chain. You can’t go anywhere without spotting the ubiquitous blue and white branding. There are three in Manchester, and five in Dubai. There’s even one in Istanbul. Now they’ve taken over the prime location of the old NatWest bank in Grey Street. 

It’s a clever concept: you think you’re buying into the vision of the genial white-haired celebrity chef, but the Carluccio machine isn’t actually owned by Antonio Carluccio at all. He’s just a consultant who gets wheeled out to openings to sign the books they sell in the deli.