Eat Out London!Paesan
Paesan
Fabrizio has been with us since the beginning and he epitomises Paesan.
Fabrizio comes from Anzio a small town just outside of Rome (Lazio) and he has a deep identity and unwavering passion for traditional Italian food.
He has created seasonal menus for Paesan from the very beginning, where he uses his vast experience to create simple dishes that are full of flavour.
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Restaurant review: Forget sophisticated, Paesan is all about good ...
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As my half-eaten bowl of pasta is removed, I’m getting the impression I’m a disappointment to the staff of Paesan, this new casual Italian joint in Exmouth Market.
It’s finished with briciole, the crunchy fried breadcrumbs traditionally used as a cheap substitute for Parmesan in ‘cucina povera’, the Italian peasant cooking that Paesan is inspired by.
It’s difficult imagining Paesan’s well-heeled clientele going without Parmesan for even a day and equally hard to ignore the irony of a £45-a-head restaurant themed on a style of cooking that emerged from a time of dire poverty in Italy’s history.
It’s rustic Italian by way of downtown Manhattan and the style will be familiar to anyone who has eaten in a Russell Norman restaurant, as might head chef Mattia Antonioni who previously worked at Polpo.
Paesan is never going to deliver a sophisticated gastronomic experience – it’s the sort of place where everything from your water and wine to your dessert and bill arrives in a glass tumbler.
Restaurant review: Paesan, 2 Exmouth Market, London, EC1 | The ...
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Twenty years ago, the River Café introduced us to the concept of cucina rustica, Italian country cooking with its paste-thick bread-and-bean soups, its dark armpitty flavours.
Now Paesan, a new north London restaurant, brings us 'cucina povera', which translates, not as 'poverty cooking' but 'peasant cooking'; though its owner, Anthony Brown, founder of the popular Pasta Brown establishment in Covent Garden, steers cautiously around the p-word.
It is a truism that the Italians have no equivalent phrase for 'haute cuisine', and that classic Italian dishes, enjoyed all over the world, haven't changed a lot since Garibaldi's day, except in regional variants.
The Piccolo section of small sharing plates includes the Café favourite of anchovy and Parmesan, but done in breadcrumbed crocchette, very light and piquant; a caponata of burrata and aubergine that's gloriously soft and sensuous on the tongue; and grilled radicchio with a strip of hot cheese and a lovely fruity mostardo, half of which was fine, and half burnt almost black.
Provided you're not expecting high-drama (or High-Table) Italian food, this newcomer to bustling Exmouth Market will show you a fine time.
Paesan
Fabrizio has been with us since the beginning and he epitomises Paesan.
Fabrizio comes from Anzio a small town just outside of Rome (Lazio) and he has a deep identity and unwavering passion for traditional Italian food.
He has created seasonal menus for Paesan from the very beginning, where he uses his vast experience to create simple dishes that are full of flavour.
Grace Dent reviews Paesan | London Evening Standard
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ES Food Newsletter These days Exmouth Market in Clerkenwell feels like a thoroughly taken-for-granted gem.
Well, they do if they’re those lovely clever Continental kitchen-savvy peasants who Jamie Oliver and Rick Stein inevitably meet whenever they hop off a plane in Brindisi and begin bumming the leg off some poor skint sap down a vennel in Puglia rubbing stale bread with bargain-bin tomatoes.
Peasant food as a concept makes me giggle slightly as the middle classes adore it and will spend 17 hours slow-cooking some unspeakable animal gland before serving it with a boiled onion and a windblown dandelion, gleeful that dinner cost 19p.
The beans really were peasant food, cooked for a lot of peasants, some time earlier that day.
Paesan, 2 Exmouth Market, EC1R 4PX, paesanlondon.com More of Grace Dent's restaurant reviews
Restaurant: Paesan, London EC1 | Life and style | The Guardian
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As a descendant of actual Italian peasants – the photo of one black-clad great-great-grandmother, clutching a scythe, a patch covering her empty eyesocket and looking like a jovial grim reaper, is a particular family favourite – I approached Paesan with a degree of caution.
Using this as a hook to serve cheap ingredients, massively marked up, to droves of affluent London thirtysomethings leaves as murky a taste in my mouth as Paesan's arancini.
Oh, and how does steak "tagliata" with parmesan and Roman misticanza salad sit under this banner?
Paesan's feel as if they've been made from masticated blotting paper.
I've been waiting for pizza fritta (fried) to hit the mainstream over here: this wonderfully reprehensible carbfest was born in Naples and has become a bit of a thing in New York.