May 25 2008
Café Andiamo Review
The Degraves St strip (including the arcade through to Collins St) is home to one of the most vibrant and bohemian cafe scenes in Melbourne. Small cafes jostle with each other for your attention, and traditional simple, non-corporate cooking is the order of the day. There is little better than sitting by the side of the Strip for an hour or so and watching some of the more interesting elements of Melbourne fashion stroll by.
With this in mind I headed for Café Andiamo, one of the largest cafe’s (at least in outdoor tables) in the whole strip.
Service Quality - 6/10
The place goes for an authentic Italian feel and cuisine, with a perhaps all too dizzying array of pizza options. The main portion of the menu is a typical Italian listing with around a dozen of the usual suspects, matriciana, mafiosa and the like – but all in any of your choice of liniguini, fettucini, spaghetti, gnocchi, or risotto…yes risotto! But that’s around 60 different combinations of food for the kitchen to handle, on top of the pizza, lunch and special menus.
In the cafe business, trying to please everybody all too often ends up pleasing no-one as the quality suffers for quantity. So with some trepidation I ended up going for the Del Pescatore risotto, a seafood dish with a spicy tomato sauce.
The service itself was courteous, but let itself down somewhat by bringing a coke to the table in a can with a straw – is it that hard to get a glass with some ice in it?
Service Speed 6/10
Perhaps as a result of the complicated menu the food was not particularly fast to arrive – it took over 20 minutes, although in the past I have waited 30+ minutes. Still when it came out it was piping hot and fresh – no complaints there!
Food Quality 7/10
Definitely the most important bit, and I was pleasantly impressed with the risotto. It was a perfectly solid dish, the rice was firm not mushy; the seafood was not overpowered by the chili, so overall the balance was good. The mussels could have been better, and again from a service aspect the waitress missed the chance to offer parmesan or pepper.
Ambiance 7.5/10
It’s hard not to look cool when you’re in the middle of Degraves St but Cafe Andiamo fits right in, with traditional floor to ceiling wooden panelling and decor that adds to the Degraves experience.
Value for Money 6.5 / 10
Not cheap, but neither is it priced outrageously high. It stands well in the locale as one of the pack, perfectly able to mix it with the competition, without doing anything to actually stand out from the crowd.
Looks good I think I will give this a try for a special occasion dinner.
Looks good I think I will give this a try for a special occasion dinner.
Hmmm, I dunno about that, I think most womens idea of a ‘special occaision dinner’ would be a Fenix, Flower Drum or similar. This is more of a once-a-month regular lunch type place, than a once-off-for-a-special-occaision locale.
A women reading like to comment on what level of restaurant would qualify for being taken to for a special occaision?