Alba Restaurant

Run and owned by the Venerandi family since 1990, this excellent Italian restaurant has a pleasant whiff of permanence about it, though the cuisine is modern enough, blended with traditional regional and Piedmontese specialities, including the wines and grappas. At the right time of the year expect to find white truffles from Alba making an appearance at table.

An a la carte menu operates and in the evening there is a fixed price menu. Taking the a la carte expect to find amongst the antipasti carpaccio of beef fillet, Sardinean crispbread and summer truffle or a warm salad of octopus and mixed beans. Amongst the pasta dishes my eye was drawn towards the hand made spaghettini with fresh clams and bottarga grey mullet roe, though in the end the ravioli of crab with lobster sauce and crayfish galloped home.

Main dishes came up with escalope of veal with pears in Gorgonzola sauce, and a rather enticing tuna steak with sesame seeds, fresh broad beans and baby carrots. A rucola and parmesan salad on the side makes a refreshing change.

When it comes to dessert time the quality of mercy is not exactly strained, starting with the bunet piemontese, chocolate and amaretti biscuit crème with fresh cream, the inevitable but ever popular tiramisu, or for the connoisseurs a selection of Tuscan Pecorino cheese with chestnut honey, pears ands walnuts.

The evening menu fixee has much less choice but is perfectly adequate and offers exceptionally good value. The Italian wine list is a symphony of delight, an absolute must for anybody with a taste for wine from the region.