Well, here it is - the review I promised of the best local restaurant in Stoke Newington.

It is a friend’s birthday, she’s been away for a while, where else to go for a celebration with close friends but the place that always puts a smile on your face and the tastiest pizza and pasta in your belly?

As there were 12 of us we needed to book a table so didn’t go to our usual Il Bacio Express (no booking, no cards) but to the slightly more formal Il Bacio up the road and I can safely say that we weren’t disappointed.

Il Bacio Express has pizza and aubergine parmigiano served on plain wooden tables with clay carafes of table wine. It is a bustling little place bursting with Sardinian welcome and warmth, even the MTV above the serving hatch just adds to its holiday appeal.

Il Bacio (normal) has the same pizzas but more extensive and sophisticated pasta and wine menus, served on crisp white table cloths and the wine in proper glasses. It is a little more expensive (we paid £22 a head, Express is nearer to £15) and the service is a bit more reserved but it is still a gorgeous intimate restaurant.

The pizzas are out of this world, thin, bubbly bases covered in the best of ingredients - zesty tomato sauce, freshest buffalo mozarella and wonderful Sardinian charcuteries, mmmm. And, as I have mentioned before, Melanzane Parmigiano is another dish I’d walk 500 miles for. But this time it was the pastas that really stood out - you know a restaurant means business when there are 6 different seafood pasta/risotto dishes on the menu, we had almost all of them, and all were d-e-l-i-c-i-o-u-s.

So if you’re ever in Stokey check them out.

5/5

Starters £5-6 (but I’ve never had one for fear of running out of room)
Main £7.50-9
House wine £7.50 (1/2L carafe)

IL BACIO EXPRESS
90 Church Street
Stoke Newington N16
London
020 7249 2344
www.ilbacioexpress.com/

4.5/5

Starters £7
Main £9-14
House wine £19

Il Bacio
61 Stoke Newington N16
www.ilbaciohighbury.co.uk/firststoke.htm