A cousins outing to East London, where some cousins live. I am sure I must have been Luigi's many years ago, as it is a bit of a local institution out there, but I did not recognise it and it has probably been remodelled - it looks fairly fresh if not old-school inside.
This is an old fashioned Italian restaurant favoured by those who want brimming plates of familiar dishes, and judging by the Saturday night crowd, it is full of regulars who are greeted by 'Luigi' like long lost friends/customers. The place is quite large, but I have no idea if booking is necessary. I did not see anyone turned away during the evening. They have a somewhat pedestrian web site on http://www.luigis-italian-restaurant.co.uk/ which is still advertising New Years Eve 2014.
The place is fairly welcoming and the staff certainly try to be helpful. There is a menu which is visible on the web site, and a specials board. I ate off the specials, which may or may not have been the best idea.
For starter, I had chicken livers, which were said to be fried and with a tomato and onion sauce.
My Samsung phone probably does not do this justice, but it give the right message that this was a big portion, which was a bit gloopy. The sauce tended to drown out the flavour of the liver, which was a pity, but it was ok. It was hot enough scoring a 8.4 on the CHOF scale. I cannot say I would recommend this, but it was ok.
For main course, I chose the special Venison steak, medium. I was told that this would come in a red wine sauce, but by the time it was served, I had forgotten this.
As you can see, it was pretty huge, and came with sauté potatoes. I had a side of steamed spinach. As you can see, there was no sauce, but by the time I remembered, it was too late. I have to say that compared to the vegetables it was served with, it could have been hotter, and only rated a 7.7 on the CHOF scale. It was also a bit tougher than I expected. Had I not been in company it would have gone back.
Incidentally the waiter, who may have been fresh off the boat (from eastern Europe) served the people on either side of me with the wrong main course, and when this was indicated, he insisted that the mistake was ours, and the orders were as they had requested. After tasting, it was decided that table waiting in an Italian restaurant was beyond his current skill set, and an informal exchange of plates was arranged.
There was a mature musician playing 'easy listening' music on his electric piano at a volume that jarred for me, but not my companions who love live music. He was greeted by many of the patrons, and is clearly a local institution valued by many. Technically I am sure he was great, but I don't need to hear 'New York, New York' to distract me from meal.
Whilst the ladies of the group loved this place, the men folk were not so sure, and the male opinion was that it failed to hit the spot. I would only go back there again under a three line whip (you won't understand that if you are not British!). Cost of a meal for two including service but very little alcohol and shared desert was about £65.
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