Where to find (and eat) the best pasta in London

This Highbury trattoria has two simply iconic pasta dishes. Its pappardelle with beef shin ragu and pici cacio e pepe are the stuff of legends and have been a staple since Trullo’s early days and remain a silky, substantial delight. The pasta might get all the love, but don’t miss other dishes, such as giant Black Hampshire pork chop with borlotti beans and salsa verde. Wash it all down with an accessible and mighty Italian wine list.

Order this: Cacio e pepe.

Bancone has one dish you simply must devour - ‘silk handkerchiefs’. The delicate rectangles (call them fazzoletti if you’re feeling fancy) are dressed with walnut butter and topped with a gorgeously golden confit egg yolk. It’s officially the restaurant’s most ’Grammed dish. And, unofficially, it’s got to be one of London’s too. Heaven.

Order this: Silk handkerchiefs.

Chef and national treasure Angela Hartnett’s more casual spin-off of her Michelin-starred Murano in Mayfair features approachable Cafe Murano restos in Covent Garden, Marylebone, St James and Bermondsey. If pasta is what you wat, you won’t be let down by Ange’s signature rigatoni with spicy sausage and fennel ragu - a hearty party in the mouth. 

Order this: Pasta of the day with a glass of wine is £25. Thursdau is linguine with Portland crab and pickled celery and Friday is a pleasingly butch spaghetti alla carbonara.

This legend’s note-perfect, well-priced pastas are as raved-about now as they were the week it opened. Like tripping over massive suitcases on the tube at rush hour, standing in the ever-present queue is an irritating fact of London life. But there are things you can do to make it less of a drag. Get there very early (11.30am on a Sunday), very late (9pm on a Monday) or – like one hero Time Out spotted – bring a folding chair. Once you’re inside go classic with pappardelle and beef shin ragù. There are also branches in Shoreditch and Soho (and you can book tables at both).

Order this: Pappardelle and beef shin ragù.

Pasta for your starter and your main? Peckham’s premier purveyor actively encourages it. There’s always a choice of two different ones, and they’re always available in little and large sizes, so you could start with something lilke mushroom tortellini in a deeply savoury porcini broth then move on to a jumbo portion of perfectly chewy bucatini with confit cherry tomatoes and wild garlic. 

Order this: Ravioli di erbette.

There’s lots to love about Pastaio. The airy outdoor terrace on a pedestrianised road right by Carnaby Street; the booze-and-balsamic slushies; the hunking great big starter of garlic shrimp. And, of course, the pasta. This isn’t Italy, so don’t expect a small primi-sized offering - these are huge, main character energy bowls full of flavourful carbs, which can be trad when they want to be (aglio e olio linguine or cacio e pepe spaghetti) or a little more leftfield (nettle and sheep’s ricotta ravioli or red prawn paccheri with garlic and marjoram). Go hungry, and leave stuffed. 

Order this Whole lobster linguine for two.

Opened in 1944, the pastel-painted Brewer Street shop is stuffed to the rafters with the best pasta this side of the Dolomites. Browse the whole wall of superior dried stuff (Lina stocks the cheffy Rummo brand) or park up next to the homemade fresh-pasta counter, take it home and cook up a storm. If you can't be bothered to DIY your dinner, then there are Lina Stores restaurants on nearby Greek Street, as well as in Marylebone, Bloomberg Arcade, King's Cross, Clapham, Shoreditch, and South Ken.

Order this: Linguine con granchio e limone - with crab, Amalfi lemon, chilli and garlic.

An Italian-American restaurant right out of a Billy Joel song, Senza Fondo translates to ‘bottomless’ and that’s what they’re here to do - serve unlimited lasagna until you pass out/admit defeat/call an ambulance. Each sturdy chonk is served in a bath of bechamel and topped with a heavy cloud of parmesan shavings, and for £22 a head, you can test your nerve with all-you-can-eat lasagna in meaty (slow-cooked beef shin) or veggie (artichoke) versions. Handily, this is good stuff. Eight-ish densely-packed layers of pasta that holds its form rather than slopping all over the place.

Order this: The lasagna, of course.

Dinner at this waterside Italian isn’t just a chance to scoff some of the city’s most skilfully made pasta, it’s a (delicious) science lesson. The clever bods behind Emilia’s Crafted Pasta have spent years working out exactly which pasta goes best with which sauce. So their bolognese is paired with wide silky ribbons of fresh egg pappardelle, while their carbonara (made in the northern Italian style, using the whole egg) is complemented by the rougher texture of dried semolina pasta. Sit back and let the staff guide you – they seriously know their stuff.

Order this: Carbonara.

Back in the pre-decimal days, if you wanted to eat pasta in London, you had to go to a trattoria – a checked-tablecloth kind of place where the pepper mills were the size of scaffolding poles and the wine came in straw-covered bottles. Today these places are a dying breed, but this Bloomsbury institution still does a roaring trade in spaghetti vongole, meatballs in tomato sauce and old-school carbonara. Small-plates-haters take note: the ones here are massive.  

Order this: Spaghetti vongole.

Looking for the most mum-friendly restaurant in central London? Polished Italian mega-trattoria Burro is the answer to your panicked family-dinner prayers. A central London offshoot of Trullo, all pasta is handmade and the menu changes twice daily. Our ribbons of yellow fettuccine are intertwined with a rich duck and porcini ragu, and showered with Parmesan. The mushroomy, meaty mix was as good as anything we’ve ever had at Trullo.

Order this: Fettuccine with duck and porcini ragu.

Settle down among the chrome vases and midcentury light fittings for a retro menu of regional pasta classics. Dalla head chef Mitchell Damota served time at Burro e Salvia and P Franco, and just as the room is filled with vintage Italian goodies, so is his menu. Made daily and in-house, on our visit there’s an immaculately chewy trofie slicked with luminescent parsley presto and formaggio di capra (that’s goats cheese to those of us not raised on Antonioni and Fellini movies). Even better was an otherworldly fieno di canepina with mushroom and sausage. Think of it as tagliatelle on Ozempic, a skinny, long noodle swirled with pungent porcini.

Order this: There are usually just three pasta dishes on the menu. Get one of each.

Freshly hand-rolled at the start of every service, the pasta at this low-lit Shoreditch spot is seriously sexy (think crab taglierini or pork-cheek agnolotti with porcini butter) and everything is made for sharing. Bag two stools at the window bar overlooking Rivington Street and get ready to re-enact Disney’s most famous romantic (dogs’) dinner scene; unless you order the ravioli – in which case, it’s going to be more like the suck-and-blow beer mat game, sorry.

Order this: Pork-cheek agnolotti with porcini butter.

Forget cardboardy lasagne sheets and gritty fusilli – the future of gluten-free pasta is here, and it’s every bit as delicious as the wheaty OG. The vast majority of this bustling Bermondsey joint’s dishes can be made with gluten-free penne on request; and sauce-wise, the sky’s the limit. Whether you’re in the mood for slow-cooked beef-shin ragù or a fancy preserved truffle and butter emulsion, it’s got you covered. 

Order this: Gigli with sausage, fennel, puntarelle and chilli ragu.