Cibo e Vino
It is usually with great regret that we sometimes find ourselves eating out with friends in Castle Hill. This suburb seems to suffer from a lack of decent dining options – a lack, in my opinion, of places that I would happily return to. I’ll never forget for example, the cold pizzas at a now defunct Italian restaurant in the Castle Towers forecourt, and their “Turkish Apple Tea” which tasted like they had run out of said tea and had just heated some apple juice in a pot instead, hoping that no one would notice.
So when my mother said one day that she had found a place serving excellent Italian food in Castle Hill, I was initially cautious, then eventually excited. Cibo e Vino, located opposite the dreaded Castle Towers forecourt turns out to be a bit of a gem. So much so that I wanted to write about it, even though I neglected to take any pictures when we visited, and haven’t really been bothered to write anything about other good places we’ve eaten at of late.
The chef, fresh from a stint at London’s The River Cafe, is ticking all the right boxes; delivering food that you’d want from your local Italian restaurant : delicious, rustic food with an emphasis on fresh produce and flavour.
We start with shared plates of assorted fritters and piadini. The crispy fritters (my favourite being the chickpea one) come with aioli and a wedge of lemon. Simple, and so good. A perfect, unfussy entree that paves the way for our mains which are equally impressive.
I don’t usually order gnocchi because often you get served quite a hefty, heavy dish that leaves you feeling like you just ate your weight in potatoes. The potato gnocchi at Cibo e Vino however, are incredibly light, and paired with chestnuts, sage, pumpkin and goats cheese, it is also a very tasty dish with heart-warming (but not heart-clogging) flavours. Even if it does look very beige. Braised rabbit is soft, moist and suitably tomatoey, even if a plate of shredded meat piled on top of mash looks a bit like something you could eat through a straw.
Which is probably my only criticism of this restaurant. It could do with maybe a tiny bit of effort on the presentation front. Most of the dishes we were served looked like something I would have carelessly plonked onto a plate for dinner at home. Also the bare tiled floors and generic plastic furniture lend a kind of ‘temporary’ air to the place. And it’s loud. It’s so loud (due to lack of any sort of noise absorbers) that I could barely hear what my dining companions were saying.
But it probably doesn’t matter all that much, when you know you can go to a place on a regular basis and know that you will be served decently priced, fabulous food. So when we finally settle back into our chairs, lingering over cups of coffee and complimentary pieces of cute, stubby biscotti, I can’t help but smile. Smile, because I know that at last, I’m in a restaurant in Castle Hill that I can’t wait to come back to.
Cibo e Vino
Shop 2, 299 Old Northern Road,
Castle Hill 2145.
HT said,
April 27, 2008 @ 10:38 pm
omfg. hell! I just ate at mediocre Indian behind Castle Mall, blech. will have to try cibo e vino, now that there’s somewhere which isn’t a horrible joke about food (in this restaurant they dragged out every single fucking Indian trope including one menu page dedicated to the taj mahal – the Chinese place next door was kind of eerie, lit by fluorescents and completely abandoned – the Italian place was playing JLo on Top 40 radio when we walked past).
Y said,
April 28, 2008 @ 7:14 pm
HT, you really should try Cibo out. And if you do, make sure you let me know what you think!
Huan-Tzin said,
May 10, 2008 @ 1:51 pm
so, had dinner and breakfast there. you’re right it is LOUD, like JLo Let’s Get Loud loud with a side serving of hearing impairment at peak times.
the salmon with fennel bulb was great with a frosting of delicate chargrill and my braised rabbit with wet polenta and parsley was hearty but not lumpenprolen. we ordered a side of herbed fries which was a bit much (heaped bowl) but crispy, my mother found them addictive.
the standout of the dinner was definitely the trifle with rhubarb, red wine jelly and candied almonds, all suspended in a finely balanced vanilla custard infected with the tiny black pox of genuine vanilla. it was like taking your clothes off and running through a forest playing Where’s Wally’s Delicious Lovers, exploring in naive innocence like a naughty Lewis Carroll daguerrotype. behind every leaf (or spoonful) there were little fairy explosions of gustatory surprise. even the islands of bread with their sugar snowfalls were intoxicating.
the frittata (singular pancake style) the next morning was complicated but restrained, with the same chargrill filigree coming out with my bacon. the bread could have been less toasted but meh.
very familiy affair.
they’ve been open for a year apparently. I wonder if it would be worth a small note to Good Living? it’s definitely one is on a city level.
Y said,
May 11, 2008 @ 11:15 am
HT you seem to have an unhealthy preoccupation with J.Lo, methinks. My mom still raves about those fries too, so I’ll have to try them the next time I go. She mentioned them because the last time we went out for dinner, we were charged FIFTEEN DOLLARS for a bowl of fries my brother ordered. Mind you, this was in a fancy area and the meal as a whole wasn’t cheap either, but $15 for what amounts to a couple of coins worth of potato seems like a rip off to me. Especially when they weren’t all that great, and certainly not as great as Cibo’s, according to my mom!
HT said,
May 18, 2008 @ 1:18 am
frankly I think it’s just chinese mothers. they seem to crave the salt or something.
HT said,
May 26, 2008 @ 10:37 pm
yo.
http://flickr.com/photos/surtr/2524329892/in/photostream/
a few under the tag “food”
HT said,
May 26, 2008 @ 10:37 pm
btw let me know if yeasayers come down, they’re the only band I want to see live. but not before august. oh no.
Y said,
June 1, 2008 @ 9:02 pm
Thanks for the link. You’re right. The trifle looks SOOOoo good!