Gosh, isn’t Ida lovely. This neighbourhood Italian has been charming Queen’s Park locals for coming up to 20 years and remains one of the best-looking buildings to approach on a chilly autumnal evening. Once a Victorian cornershop, the red-brick restaurant radiates warmth, practically glowing from behind the cotton cafe curtains, begging you to come inside and surrender yourself to the pasta gods.
That is, if you’ve booked a table. It’s absolutely rammed at 6.30pm on a Wednesday, with not a spare seat in the house. It’s a cosy, intimate space for around 20 diners tops, making the whole affair feel like you’ve been invited around to someone’s living room for a meal, rather than a restaurant. The floor is parquet, the walls are full to bursting with framed Italian prints (a Fellini movie poster here, a charming painting of a cobbled village there), Tiffany-style lights dangle from the ceiling and miniature Campari bottles have been turned into table-top lamps. We have been sufficiently wooed, well before any food comes out.
Ida comes pretty damn close to perfection
The deal is well-done Italian classics. A caprese is a basic thing but easy to fuck up if your ingredients are sub-par. Ida’s mozzarella, basil and tomato salad is perfection; the cheese salty and creamy and the tomatoes fresh and tender, everything glistening under a veil of nutty olive oil. Pasta is equally impressive. Our linguine is made in-house and swirled with tender shrimp, a pool of butter, a dollop of courgette gloop, and enough garlic to fend off any potential love interest within a five mile radius.
Onto the secondi, and the branzino al cartoccio is a non-performatively rustic wedge of seabass wrapped in parchment alongside a series of briny gifts for the afterlife; olives, capers, garlic, chillis and tomatoes, with a big old bowl of summery salad. It’s the kind of simple dish that you could do at home, but means that much more when someone cooks it for you (yes, even if you’re paying them).
Anything but tiramisu to end the meal would be treason. Ours comes in a silver coupe, dusted with a decisive layer of cocoa and containing thick, squidgy sponge within. If there’s such a thing as a perfect restaurant, Ida comes pretty damn close.
The vibe A truly lovely Italian restaurant.
The food Classic Italian dishes. Nowt fussy.
The drink Wines and spritzes and a beefy digestif menu.
If you’re not boozing, the house cherry spritz is a worthy replacement for a big chunky red wine.