Table of Contents
1 Our visit to the highly acclaimed Officina 00, Fitzrovia
I love Italian cuisine; it goes back to when I was a baby, a long time ago. When I was 18 months old, my parents took me on holiday to Italy, which was very adventurous. My mother was convinced that I would not eat the “local” cuisine, she packed a suitcase full of Heinz baby food; needless to say, I loved the pasta, and the baby food stayed in the suitcase. So many years later, the passion for pasta remains, and today, I’m thrilled to be eating at the much-acclaimed Officina 00 Fitzrovia.
I say much acclaimed based on the fact that everywhere I turn recently, I see people saying good things about this restaurant. So enough is enough, and it is time to head out of Mayfair and make the short journey to Fitzrovia.
2 Location
Officina 00 is located on Whitfield Street, a short walk from Goodge Street station. Whitfield Street is a quiet street mainly made up of offices, but amongst them, there are a couple of restaurants. The first restaurant along the street is Noize, and then you come to Officina Fitzrovia, situated on a large corner plot. If you want a pre-dinner drink before or after dinner refreshment, the Carpenters Arms is only 50 Metres from Officina. We opted for a pre-dinner drink at the Carpenters Arms, a good stopping point. It is an excellent time to mention that my plus-one eating with me is my good friend Tina, who is also a fan of all things Pasta.
Judging by the fact that the restaurant was full at 7 pm on a Wednesday night, booking is essential at Officina 00
This is Officina’s second restaurant, which opened in November 2022. Their first is near Old Street Station and opened in 2019.
3 Some background on Officina
The word Officina means workshop in Italian, and the 00 stands for the finest grade of flour to make pasta.
The co-owners and best friends, Elia Sebregondi and Enzo Mirto, grew up in Naples and unsurprisingly shared a passion for Pasta.
The ethos of Officina is to take traditional Italian dishes and enhance them with innovative cooking techniques, hence adding a slight twist to the food they serve without losing sight of their heritage.
4 Restaurant and Menu
Officina is a bright, open, modern restaurant space, helped by large windows on both sides. Inside, the restaurant has traditional table seating with bar-style seating around the outside and the open kitchen. We plumped for seats overlooking the kitchen, which is ideal for two people, especially those of us who are nosy and love seeing chefs in full flow.
Officina 00 menu is small and concise and split into four sections: Snacks, Starters, Pasta and Desserts.
Snacks and Starters
We decided on three snacks to start.
Our choices where Deep-fried ravioli, Panko Lasagna with truffle, aged provolone with aioli, and finally, the Grilled scallop in the shell.
The first two snacks highlight how Officina takes advantage of innovative cooking techniques.
The ravioli and lasagna both had a crunch to the bite and a different texture than their traditional counterparts. I’m seeing the slight tweaks in cooking that I have read about.
The scallop was served with topinambur (artichoke), black garlic and mustard leaves. It was great to see they left the roe on the scallop; far too often, it’s not served with the scallop. The scallop was perfectly cooked.
Although we did not include any starter dishes, our snack choices were ample and large enough for us as a starter.
The starter choices on the menu included Roasted Beetroot salad, Ravioli Bergese and salt and pepper squid. I will add a link to the full menu at the end.
Pasta
Okay, let’s talk about Pasta; the menu has seven fresh pasta choices. We enlisted the help of the waitress; she pointed Tina towards the signature dish, Curly Pappardelle, beef short rib, meatballs, ricotta and basil. Just typing this makes me feel hungry.
I agonised over my choice of Ink Tagliatelle, which included clams, garlic cream fried parsley or Occhi, octopus Genovese, and sour parsley pesto with the house sriracha.
Again, I consulted our waitress, and I went for the Octopus.
Tina’s Pappardelle was sensational, and it is no surprise that this has become a signature dish. The short rib was slow-cooked to melt in the mouth consistency.
As for my dish, I enjoyed the Octopus; it was cooked well, but the star flavour for me was the Genovese sauce with the sour parsley pesto, which was so good. Visually, the dish was stunning.
Desserts
A far easier choice this time, we ordered the crunchy Tiramisu with orange zest and Cointreau and Lemon Delizia with a Limoncello custard topped with a pistachio crumb to share.
Again, another subtle change of texture on the Tiramisu, which was lovely; add to that the orange flavours and we have a winner. The Delizia has intense Lemon flavours and is as light as a feather.
These two good choices were a perfect way to finish our meal.
The service was friendly and efficient, and as I’ve already suggested, our waitress showed a good understanding of the dishes on the menu. Another benefit of having a concise menu is that the staff can sample all of the menu.
We were in the restaurant just over 90 minutes, which is about right for our three courses.
5 Pasta Workshops
Officina 00 offers pasta-making workshops from its Fitzrovia restaurant. You can choose from three different courses. The workshops are available on Mondays & Wednesdays and start at £65 for the Introduction to Making pasta; all workshops are two hours.
I’m very tempted by the filled pasta workshop, so watch this space.
Officina 00 Locations
Officina 00 Fitzrovia
67 Whitfield Street,London,W1T 4DE.
Officina 00 Old Street
156 Old Street, London, EC1V 9BW
Officina 00 Menu
