L’Antica Locanda, Shambles, York (From York Press)

L’Antica Locanda, Shambles, York

12:00pm Saturday 4th July 2009 in

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GAVIN AITCHISON ambles to Shambles for some of the best Italian food in town.

THIS time five years ago, I was half-way through my best ever summer. I’d spent 12 months doing mind-numbingly tedious jobs and had finally saved enough money to go to Italy. Not on holiday, you understand. No, no. I was more pretentious than that. I went ‘travelling’.

For two months, I meandered around, sight-seeing, learning the language, and lapping up the culture. And, day after day after day, eating like a king.

Italy excels in countless ways, but it is in the kitchen that it is truly the best country in the world.

I sometimes wish I’d stayed out there rather than returning to bland Blighty but, had I done so, I wouldn’t now be in the fortunate position of being able to tell you about the one place in York where the true tastes of Italy are best provided.

For at the same time as I was swanning around cathedrals and getting to grips with the past participles of obscure verbs, a little Italian gem was opening right here in the heart of York.

L’Antica Locanda – literally, The Ancient Inn – sits inconspicuously half-way up Shambles and claims to bring “the sensuous southern Italian style and flavour to the heart of York”. It doesn’t disappoint.

A colleague and I headed along last Sunday evening and by the time we’d finished I was pining for Italy again.

We hadn’t booked but we had a choice of tables, and picked one beside an open window overlooking Shambles below.

It had been a hot day so I began with a cold starter, antipasto all’Italiana – a selection of cured meats and cheeses. I got Parma ham, Milano salami, another spicier sausage and three types of hard cheese including, I think, Pecorino and Parmigiano. There were also a few green and black olives, all arranged on a bed of lettuce.

Jen went for the paté della casa, homemade chicken liver paté with toasted ciabatta bread. The paté was rich in flavour and the juxtaposition of its smooth cold texture with the crunchy hot bread worked a treat.

For main courses, the choice was vast. The menu, refreshingly for an Italian, contains no pizza but there were dozens of pasta, meat and fish options including an extensive list of specials.

We both chose seafood, Jen going for the Gamberoni (king prawns) alla Provinciale and I for the Tonno (tuna) alla Pizzaiola.

My tuna steak came smothered in a sauce of tomato, diced olives, capers, garlic and white wine. With such ingredients, it was never going to be anything other than lively and flavoursome but the capers especially were spectacular.

The menu says side-dishes must be ordered separately but I forgot and the waitress didn’t say anything so I was left with no accompaniment. New potatoes would have worked well but, as it was, I made do with pinching a couple of Jen’s prawns as her portion was too much for her.

She got eight hefty prawns in a sauce of white wine, garlic, herbs, mushrooms, chillies and tomato, on a bed of arborio rice. The sauce was unmistakably Mediterranean, with an array of formidable flavours fighting for attention. The mushrooms won the day, coming out strongest.

I used the lack of a side-dish as an excuse to add a dessert, as the white chocolate profiteroles sounded too good to miss. I got three pastry parcels buried deep, deep beneath white chocolate, two types of cream and dark chocolate sprinkles.

At the risk of sounding repetitive, it could not have been any better.

The Australian comedian George Miller once said that the problem with eating Italian food is that you inevitably feel hungry again after five or six days, and by the time the coffees arrived, I knew what he meant.

L’Antica Locanda is not cheap – both starters were £6.75, both mains £14.95 and the total bill, including a £14 bottle of Sicilian white wine, Fiano MandraRossa, came to £67.

But then if you dine on York’s most touristy street, tourist prices are sadly inevitable.

And, most importantly of all, the food is fulsome, filling and utterly fabulous. Short of heading to Italy itself, this is the next best thing.

Gavin visited L’Antica Locanda on Sunday, June 28, 2009.

L’Antica Locanda, 33 Shambles, York. Tel: 01904 670247.

Fact file

Food: Flawless

Service: Homely

Value: Bit pricey

Ambience: Authentic