Had a wonderful brinch yesterday.  Don't know how we ended up at an Italian resto, as we didn't want pasta or pizza, but there we were.  The BIG surprise was the variety of appetisers.  These are really light meals, we found, and two appetisers made for a great brunch for two.  We enjoyed the Vitello Tonnato (very thin slices of roat veal with a tuna mayo, served with wild rocket), and Melanzane (eggplant slices baked with marinara sauce and mozzarella). As wonderful as these were, the service was the icing on the cake.  Excellent waitresses looked after our every need, even on a busy Saturday lunch hour.  The mains are quite pricey which put us off, and the appetisers were priced nicely.  We had a couple of glasses of wine and paid about $60 for two.

We wanted to celebrate our 1yr anniversary and after some recommended from a friend and my own sister "highly recommended it" stating that this is her favourite Italian restaurant.

Made the reservation online and was looking forward to our lovely dinner on a Sunday evening.

When we arrived, there was only 2 tables occupied, 1 inside and the other outside, both Japanese. I am not surprised as it is a Japanese Expat filled area.

We were given a table indoor next to the place where they place their wine and in front of the open style kitchen.

We ordered:

Buratta with Proscuitto Crudo - Love buratta, everytime when I head back to La Spezia, I will always try my luck at the supermarket even thou this isn't a specialty from Northern Italy. This buratta was light and creamy, taste wasn't too strong and was perfect with the proscuitto. It came topped with a bit of pesto, nice touch.

Fillet with Gorgonzola - Wow...the steak looks miserable when it was presented. It looks charred and was very fatty. We asked for rare and it didn't look or tasted rare. Disappointing.

Pasta with Porcini & Italian Pork Sausage - I requested for Parpadella instead of what they suggested. Too much cream, porcini wasn't fragrant and I didn't think pairing it with the sausage was a good idea.

Tiramisu - They either ran out of espresso or they are super stingy with it!! Bad, very bad indeed.

Lava Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream - This is the only thing they've seriously cooked up and got it right! Thank god for this otherwise my anniversary dinner would be ruined big time. Well like I've always mentioned, if you have house dessert special with vanilla ice cream, would appreciate if it's home made ones with real vanilla pod.

Sorry guys, had to edit it cos I just recall this disgusting sight! We wanted to order their pizza but seeing it's not done in the traditional wood oven, we opt out. Which is truly a blessing in disguise cos half way though our dinner, I saw the Indian fellow who's in charged of pizza, scratching his hair with his fingers and then back to work!!!

Think I will keep this awful experience from my sister, just remember never to recommend this place to anybody.

Price comes with a bottle of red wine.

Dropped in after some disappointing ramen, for desserts.

Had:

- 3 Profiteroles for $12. Basically they're giant cream puffs with ice cream inside, with chocolate sauce and other toppings on top.

- Lava cake. This is one of their specialities, served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream as a foil. The chocolate was intense but not too bitter - but I have a sweet tooth and don't like dark chocolate, so chocoholics might be disappointed.

- Lemon sherbert. This was good but in comparison with the other 2, nothing special.

Also had a limoncello which at $7 was a good price for a digestif. Will be sure to try the food next time - it smelled great.