Carluccio’s, St Helen’s Square, York, Review – If you are looking for a nice relaxed restaurant in the centre of York, you can’t go far wrong with Carluccio’s in St Helen’s Square. I took Miss H and two of her friends over the summer holidays to sample some proper Italian dishes. The restaurant goes back a surprisingly long way and is lovely and light at the back next to an open part of the kitchen.
Carluccio’s Kids’ Menu
There is plenty of space and the children were made welcome.
The children’s menu is a very reasonable £6.25, ostensibly for ‘two courses and a drink’, but really it felt like three as they had cucumber and celery, as well as breadsticks to dip in a tomato sauce to start.
Next there was a choice of mains, from pasta and risotto. One of the girls tried the Lasagne:
Which was delicious according to Miss W. She also finished her Mum’s lasagne which she said tasted different. She preferred the kids’ version – I wonder if the adult version of lasagne had red wine in it? Miss H went for pasta with cheese sauce:
While her cousin also went for cheese sauce but with spaghetti.
Finally they chose desserts of ice cream with a wafer:
And at the end they were presented with babyccinos that they were not expecting but were thrilled with!
My friend and I were equally well catered for and started our meal with garlic focaccia with provolone cheese:
and Scamorza Arancini – Sicilian rice balls filled with spinach and smoked mozzarella and a spicy tomato sauce. These were mine and absolutely delicious!
My friend then chose the lasagne, which she couldn’t finish (hence her daughter polishing it off!).
While I went for the Orecchiette alla Luganica, which is “spicy pork luganica sausage and tomato ragù with Grana Padano, ‘nduja and ricotta salata”. Very tasty and a good sized portion – I didn’t finish it all.
For dessert my friend chose the Torta di Cioccolata:
While I won dish of the day with this magnificent Strawberry Cheesecake Coppa – Vanilla and strawberry ice cream, fresh strawberries, strawberry coulis, meringue, ricotta-yoghurt and flaked almonds (though I asked for no almonds!). I don’t think the photo does it justice as it really had the wow factor in real life.
I finished my meal with this tiny cup of hot chocolate. It does have a fancy name but I can’t recall it! It was espresso sized and pure thick chocolate indulgence – more of a second dessert rather than a drink and as rich and decadent as they come!
Carluccio’s in York
We all enjoyed our visit to Carluccio’s in York. The children enjoyed the food and the more grown up atmosphere. There was plenty of space around the tables so we could relax and enjoy our meal. I felt the children’s menu in particular is really excellent value for money and the final bill was much lower than I expected. Oh and if you’d like to do some shopping whilst there, you can.
Also have a look at my post on other family friendly restaurants in York.
We were invited to visit and review Carluccio’s. As always, all opinions expressed are my own.