Dinner at Mad Pizza e Bar, Newtown

Adventuring into the night for what turned out to be a completely sober, bizarre reunion amongst PSYC1001 kiddies; our adventures with food led us to eat dinner at Newtown, catch a taxi to Gelato Messina at Darlinghurst; and proceed to realise that the same pizza place where we had eaten at Newtown was no more than 50m away from Messina.

Tuscano: shredded lamb shanks from Victoria, baby spinach, red onion, garden peas, mint, fetta, garlic & lemon

Ordering three pizzas and a pasta to share between four, we opted for the tuscano, funghi and primavera pizzas.

The lamb on the tuscano was lovely and juicy and the assorted toppings of vegetables were fresh and crisp. The provided lemon was a welcome relief to the fragrant spices of what I assume the lamb had been marinated in and the pizza base was perfect.

Funghi: Fat field mushrooms, rosemary, fetta & rocket leaves w/ shaved Parmesan & virgin oil

Being the mushroom fiend I am, I can find no fault with the funghi pizza. The field mushrooms were indeed fat and succulent, the rocket a lovely bitter crunch, the virgin oil dripping everywhere... I will say that for an additional 4$ the virgin oil could be replaced by truffle oil but I completely forgot about this when we were ordering. But no regrets there will always be next time (especially because this is only really a short walk from uni)

Primavera: Crisp cooked base w/ rocket leaves, diced tomatoes, shaved parmesan & sliced South Aust prosciutto

The primavera was exactly how a prosciutto pizza should taste. Although the tomato chunks look a tad too big, they were actually just the right size to create a burst of freshness in your mouth. Rocket, proscuitto and cheese could never fail anything.

Siciliano: Rigatoni pasta w/ Qld prawns, fresh tomato, Garlic, chilli, basil & pangrattato

And finally the siciliano pasta. In all honesty I can't comment much about this beyond the fact that it was pretty good. It was quite spicy though (I completely overlooked the word chilli in the menu) and I didn't end up eating much, particularly because I was inhaling my pizza slices and by the time I got to the pasta I was already pretty damn full.

I loved the vibe of this place, and the cute customer service we received on the quiet Monday night we decided to go in on. All the pizzas were gobsmackingly delicious and I'm interested to see if there are any real differences between all the different other locations dotted around city of what seems to be this pizza "franchise".

Verdict: Will be back

Part 2 of this night's adventure continues here!

Dinner at La Rosa Bar and Pizza, City CBD

Celebrating the end of Tina's exams and catching up with Nat (there's a general trend here isn't there?), we went somewhere a little bit fancier than the usual by going to a cosy Italian joint in the beautiful strand, La Rosa Bar and Pizza.

Polpettine di Carne con Salsina Piccante alle Olive - Free Range Pork and Parmesan Meatballs with Spicy Chilli Salsa

For starters, Nat and I shared a small range of polpettine meatballs which had polenta 'tater totts' (I can't think of any other way to describe them and a lovely salsa in accompaniment. The pork meatballs were excellent and the salsa was a lovely addition although in all honesty, the meatballs were succulent and juicy enough on their own that the salsa was not an immediate necessity; more like (and as it should be) a nice complement to the dish. The polenta totts were tasty and I could have a bowl of these all day, dipping them slowly in salsa and smacking my lips repeatedly.

Salame di Wagyu - Tuscan Style Mixed Wagyu Beef and Pork

I'm not going to lie, usually I never order salame at a restaurant, but I feel like that predominantly lies in the fact that most average go-to Italian restaurants don't feature options upon options of salami and moreover, I recently re-watched Eat, Pray, Love again and a particular scene of Julia Roberts passing a woman in a restaurant eating figs and salami has been firmly entrenched in my mind.

Anyway, the wagyu salami was so damn good. Not at all sinewy, full of flavour; and when combined with the buttery bread, a drizzle of olive oil, the olives and some of the pickled vegetables; it was heavenly combination of textures and flavours in my mouth.

(Bruschette) Pomodoro e Olive con Ricotta Salata - Tomatoes, Black Olive and Salted Ricotta

Tina ordered an unsurprising traditional bruschette combination; although I only had a bite, the tomatoes were fresh, the amount of olive oil drizzled on was perfect and the ricotta was a great addition to the palette-cleansing starter.

Moscardini Ubriachi - Tomato & Olive Oil Braised “Drunken” Baby Octopus with Fennel, Caper & Parsley Salad

For mains, Tina ordered the baby octopus; but I only got a brief taste of this and I don't think I'm justified in commenting about it given that I've only ventured briefly into the world of octopus through the side-door of takoyaki. Tina did note that it was incredibly heavy on the palette, so by the end of is she had to give a good portion of it to Nat to finish for her.

I can no longer find this on the menu, but the above was my pasta dish of choice; a wholewheat bigoli of some sort, with a pork accompaniment that had been infused with truffle oil. The infusion with truffle was just right (given in my homemade adventures with truffles, I've come to discover that there is such a thing as over-infusing something with truffles), and the wholewheat pasta made me feel like an incredibly healthy aficionado for some reason. Although hardly one of the most beautiful dishes, I still highly enjoyed this.

La Rosa is an incredibly intimate place with dim moody lighting via candles in the early evening, moving onto unobtrusive 'mushroom glowing' lights in the late evening. Filled with romantic couples, birthday dinners and even a hen's night (a classy one I gather); it was a perfect place to sip rose and enjoy an evening catching up with good friends. And with an Urbanspoon rating of 91% based on 305 votes, that's a pretty impressive feat. 

My only qualm may be that our waiter was a tad inattentive and it took a while for him to realise we were attempting to catch his attention to order some wine to start off with; and during the course of the night it was generally fairly hard to wave him over. Albeit this minor detail, I'm far from disappointed by the restaurant; service is, after all, associated very much with the level of 'fine dining' a restaurant possesses. Maybe it was because I've just been to Popolo, but I don't think La Rosa has quite reached 'fine dining' status, although it's pretty close to it.