BRYANSTON, JOHANNESBURG
Pistacchio is fantastico!
Janine Walker, WINE magazine
Posted Mon, 05 Mar 2007

Parkmore’s delightful trattoria Cucina Italiano is run by Paolo Adamo. His twin brother Raffaele has opened a new establishment in Bryanston called Pistacchio...

Food is clearly in their genes. Their parents founded Johannesburg’s well-known Cortina restaurant in 1971 and both boys grew up helping out.

Raffaele’s is the bigger establishment with a large menu. No prize for guessing that it has an Italian slant. Also no awards for surmising that the interior is painted a soothing shade of pistachio green. It’s fresh, pretty and inviting.

Pistacchio looks out over a car park that in itself is not unusual in Joburg. For some bizarre reason it seems to be a prerequisite of restaurant location! However, in the middle of the parking lot is a car wash which is spectacularly ugly during daylight hours. A room with a view it isn’t…

Good news is that the food more than makes up for it. Those who visited Adamo’s previous establishment — Parktown North’s Ramazzotti’s — will find some familiar dishes on the appetising menu.

We ordered a selection of starters to sample. There’s no ubiquitous Parma ham draped over melon. No, wafer-thin slices of prosciutto are wrapped around rocket to create a tower effect and come with gorgeous caramelised onions in a tangy caramelised sauce.

The carpaccio is accompanied by a salad of butter beans marinated in olive oil and balsamic and tossed with baby salad leaves while the batons of fried haloumi cheese are given a lift courtesy of a homemade chilli dip.

The only dish that disappointed slightly was the grilled calamari, caper and roasted pepper salad. I would have liked some other lettuce leaves to come with the plain old iceberg.

The culinary treat continued with the mains. One of the house specialities is fillet steak with Raffe’s famous pepper sauce. It was well-hung, cooked perfectly rare, and accompanied by potato wedges and roasted veggies — very well-priced at R82 all in.

The pasta was some of the best we’d eaten in ages. The homemade mushroom and feta ravioli is marvellous in a burnt butter and sage dressing. (On a second visit we ordered it and it came without the sage as the chef had run out. Naughty! We should have been told before the dish arrived at the table. Burnt butter without sage is like a caprese salad without mozzarella!)

The spaghetti comes with slices of thin prosciutto, capers, lime and olive oil. The prawns are also a revelation — butterflied, stuffed with citrus and pistachio couscous and topped with a light garlic hollandaise sauce.

The dessert menu was a bit of a let down — mainly ice-cream and things like Italian kisses. Best round off a fabulous meal with an espresso.

Pistacchio has a small and rather limited winelist — the Bat’s Rock Chenin Blanc is R60 while at the other end of the scale the Mulderbosch Chenin Blanc is R174. On the red side the Bat’s Rock Ruby Cabernet is R66 and the Danie de Wet Nature in Concert Pinot Noir is R255.

We settled on the Frascati at R105 a bottle. The only wine available by the glass is a house white and red.

Average price of a three-course meal, without wine: R120

Pistacchio, Cnr Bruton and William Nicol Drive, Bryanston. Tel: 011 706 8948. Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner from Tuesday to Sunday. BYO R30.

This review first appeared in WINE magazine.