Da Paolo Il Ristorante

Ate there for one of our LA Lunches. It's a small place so reservations are a must.

1) Must-tries:
-Portobello al Forno ($24), oven baked portobello mushroom with taleggio and baby spinach;
-Carpaccio di Manzo ($24) was a wonderful marriage of paper-thin raw beef tenderloin, bitter rucola and salty shaved parmesan;
-Tagliaetelle al Granchio ($26), homemade egg pasta ribbons with crabmeat, tomatoes, cream and vodka;
-Tagliolini Verdi alla Paolo ($25) was a fragrant and delicious spinach pasta with ham, mushrooms, cream and gratin with parmesan
-Fettuccine ai Funghi Porcini ($25), flat ribbons of egg pasta with porcini, cream and herbs, was a heady concoction of aromatic porcini mushrooms
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2) Good::
-Insalata Caprese ($16) was an Italian mainstay salad of fresh buffalo mozzarella, sweet juicy tomatoes and mesclun greens drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and garnished with sweet basil strips;
-Insalata di Spinaci con Prosciutto Crudo e Melone ;
-Minestrone;

3) Don't try:
-Calamari Fritti (rubbery);
-Cream of Mushroom ($12) (too thin and watery);
-Linguine alla Vongole ($24) (sandy clams)

Read more abt it at http://thehungrybunnie.blogspot.com

A pleasant minimalistic converted shophouse serving average Italian food. The Squid Ink & Calamari pasta is worth a try whereas if the incredibly salty chicken "special" was anything to go by it may be worth sticking to the menu.

Competent and pleasant waiting staff.

We ordered:

1) Caprese
Tomatoes were not ripe/juicy enough.

2) Duck Liver with Spinach
Very yummy! Duck liver was pretty well seared, spinach leaves were fresh and abundant. Highly recommended!

3) Homemade Egg Pasta with Crayfish and Cherry Tomato
Pasta was really al dente. Crayfish was fresh and sweet. Highly recommended!

4) Homemade Spinach Tagliatelle with Duck Slices and Mushrooms
Pasta was rather overcooked and overall taste of the dish was just passable.


Overall:

Service was rather "business-like". Forget about warmth or sincerity. They get the job done, period. The manager can appear condescending at times.

Bread came only slightly warm. Very different from how it used to be. We remembered the bread served at Da Paolo to be freshly-baked and really delicious.

Went twice in last 3 weeks for dinner. Food pretty good (Pasta very good, esp. the Gnochi), Ambience nice but service very mixed: last time the waiter was very grumpy and also forgetful (e.g., forgot our bottle of wine and was not happy after we reminded them of this). Overall we spend 300 SGD for 3 persons including one bottle of good Italian wine for SGD 80. Good and solid choice but I found value for money a bit lacking.

been going to da paolo since they opened their first outlet. went back to the club st branch for dinner recently. food quality & serving portions are still good. starter + main & no room left for dessert which was a pity. i had the soup of the day, it was thick & rich. the tomato based pasta was a tad too salty & oily but cooked till al dente. my better half started with the spaghetti bolognese, his pasta was slightly over cooked but the meat quality was good. for mains he had their vitello alla milanese. it was very tasty, light crust which was not over oily. overall meal was good & service was excellent.

And it is all about the pasta.

The best course of the evening was the home made squid ink pasta. There is absolutely nothing like it that i have tasted so far.

And this time, the chef did not dissapoint on this particular dish.

The freshness of the pasta once again played on my tounge, as the flavours of the crayfish and tomatoes blended well. The sweetness of the sea was simply lovely. However, the crayfih was just a tad overdone. Or perhaps it turned a little tougher because it turned cold when i left my table halfway.

As i mentioned in my previous review, i organized my company dinner there and while the pasta was the star of the show, the main course, however, failed to shine.

Do try the Parma Ham and Rock Melon as your starter as the mix of sweet and salty was a nice change from the usual salad. One thing though, i wished my melon slice was riper and larger....

As always, Italians make the best Tiramisu. I believe that the tiramisu here deserves a double thumbs up from me. It is not overly, cloyingly sweet. In fact, goes really well with the palate. It is unpretentious, the dessert comes on a plate, though not pretty, the flavours are divine, with a touch of class. I almost spoke in italian after having my tounge romanced by the lovely cheese, espresso and rum.

For a large group like mine, the service was just not as good as how i wanted it, but for dates and people who like privacy, this will be a good place for you to not only dine, but to dine well.

But dont forget, it is all about the (home-made) pasta at Da Paolo.

Happy Eating, everyone!

It's the pasta.

It has always been about the pasta at Da Paolo.

There is no denying that fresh pasta, hand-made with love, erm..ok, PASSION, every morning will make a difference with each mouthful that you take.

Fine, granted that i had a sodium attack during my taste test for a corporate event, i called up the events executive and told her my comments and now i will be retuning to another taste test tomorrow.

I shall update again after my company dinner and i hope that i can once again tell you, it is all about the pasta.

In the meantime, Happy eating!

Had lunch there with my colleagues today as we needed a quiet place for lunch. The first time few weeks back we wanted to go there, but a less-than-enthusiatic wait staff curtly told us:"we don't have set lunches. If you want set lunches, you can go next door", which was Jerry's BBQ and Grill.

Today the service was much better, although they still don't have set lunches. For a place with such a reputation, I actually find it quite unforgiving for them to serve cold run-of-the-mill plain crusty bread.

The main courses we had were so-so, with the spinach pasta and baked seafood pasta in tomato sauce tasting only so-so. The vongole was better as it was cooked just al dente with fresh clams. But alas, the mushroom risotto I had was just plain bland. Perhaps they meant to showcase the taste of the mushrooms, but the mushrooms needed to be r-e-a-l-l-y outstanding for that to happen. Sadly, they were not. Bland rice + bland mushrooms with parsley = bland bland lunch. My colleague kept topping hers with salt just to liven up her tastebuds abit. Didn't stay for any dessert or coffee / tea in the end.

I went away disappointed, because I thought the food would match its reputation. Or maybe I was expecting too much huh. Probably won't be going back anytime soon.

Had lunch date here today at the suggestion of the boyfriend (note: he is not the investment banker - I am).

We had the bruschetta and vegetable soup to share. The bruschetta was great (although my favourite still remains Trattoria Lafiandra's) but the vegetable soup was rather blah as it lacked punch.

We tried the squid ink pasta after having read HGW reviews which recommended it and I'm beginning to wonder if it's the same one - the one we ordered was basically a squid ink pasta pouch filled with seabass topped with a tomato based sauce. It's not bad (especially since it's fish filling we're talking about) but is this what everyone is raving about? Well if it is I just don' t get it. What also bothered me was that it was served lukewarm.

Also had the grilled prawn with garlic and rosemary and potatoes as we didn't want a carb overload. The prawn was flavourful although sadly overcooked (sadly, such an unfortunate common occurence).

I was looking forward to dessert and ordered the Valhorna chocolate cake which was, aiyoh, so disappointing. Worse still was the vanilla ice-cream which was tak standard lah - looked and tasted like Magnolia. I would have expected to serve at least a half decent vanilla bean ice-cream.

Coffee had a lovely dark-cloured crema but alas tasted really burnt.

$146 for the two of us - two appetizes, two mains, 2 coffees, a (disappointing) chocolate cake, an OJ and a bellini.

I haven't been here for a while but I have a friend which swears by this place, and he always has the Squid Ink Pasta. If you want to get good Italian place, classy service and a nice night out (its kinda llike a dating kinda place), you can't miss with this one. However if I was your date I'd find you typical and quite unimaginative, Maybe you might be an investment banker or worse yet, a lawyer. And for you who are insulted by my comments, too bad, i used to be both.

So double Chope on my insults.