July 2003

It seemed strange to me that, as a resident of the Cowley Road area for five years, and being someone who loves to eat out, I'd never before been to La Capannina. This Italian restaurant is situated a little outside of the centre of the Cowley Road nightlife, and never seemed very busy. I often asked friends if they had eaten there, but very few had. I decided it was time to try it out for myself.

We arrived at the restaurant at about 9pm on a Friday night, and there were only about five occupied tables in a deceptively large seating area. We received a warm welcome as we arrived, and were seated in a booth, and there were bread rolls, bread sticks, and butter on the table - always a nice touch. While we looked over the menu I had an ogle at the décor - the owners are certainly achieving the tacky taverna look, with lots of wood panelling, fairy lights outside, and strange coloured plastic panels set into the walls inside. There were also lots of unusual pictures - a large photograph of a pheasant watched over our booth.

The menu had lots of choice and ranged in price quite considerably - there were lots of well-priced pasta dishes at the £5/6 mark, but the meat dishes were closer to £9/10. We weren't shown a wine list, but asked for Pinot Grigio, and got a not-bad bottle, at the not-bad price of £14.50.

For starters, I had mushroom canapé (£3.90), not knowing what this what but keen to find out, and my companion had pate maison (£3.50). The mushroom canapé turned out be semi-posh cheese and mushrooms on toast - nice enough but nothing special. The verdict on the pate was "it's house pate, innit?", boyf not being a natural critic.

When ordering the main courses, the waiter had asked us whether we wanted accompaniments but I hadn't realised that the main courses came alone. My side-order of croquettes turned out to be a necessity rather than a luxury! I had chicken escalope Valdostana (£8.90), which was described as chicken with asparagus and mozzarella. This was a flavoursome combination but hardly an artful creation - imagine you were asked to make chicken with asparagus and mozzarella; I got that on a large plate which only served to emphasise I was paying almost nine pounds for a smallish piece of chicken, some cheese, and 3 sticks of asparagus. I got two homemade croquettes for £1.20, and these were very tasty.

Boyf had lamb peperonata (£9.50), lamb served with a tomato and sweet pepper sauce. The portion was a reasonable size and the sauce was apparently very tasty with lots of garlic in it. He had sauté potatoes (£1), which were also pleasing.

We decided to pass on pudding, although the menu was quite extensive - the Amaretto cake (£3) sounded particularly appealing. The verdict? Could do better. The service was friendly and polite but I felt that the food was overpriced, and my warm feelings about there being bread on the table evaporated when the bill arrived and I found we were being charged (£1) for it! All in all, the meal cost £42.50. Next time, I think I'll be going back to Mario's.

Claire Lishman, 20.07.03