Looking for the most mum-friendly restaurant in central London? Polished Italian mega-trattoria Burro is the answer to your panicked family-dinner prayers. We aren’t shy when it comes to singing the praises of perfect little Highbury restaurant and perennial Time Out favourite Trullo, and Burro is its big ticket, ultra-accessible off-shoot. Taking the original Trullo concept (handmade pasta, charming service, salty snacky bits, actual tablecloths), Belfast-born founder Conor Gadd has super-scaled it for the West End masses with a 100-cover restaurant that comes on like a culinary Goldilocks. It’s not too flashy but not too basic, not too pricey but not too cheap, not too experimental but not too cautious. Burro is just right.
The most mum-friendly restaurant in central London
Reminiscent of a nice hotel lobby, the vast room is thick with the sweet smell of Parmesan. It’s not quite as charming and intimate as Trullo, but what is? There are high ceilings, a huge oil painting of Speedo-sporting Italian bathers, sleek mid-century chairs sourced from a convent (very chic), and velvet banquettes in a geometric pattern not dissimilar to tube moquette. If the Orient Express mated with a Victoria line train, Burro would be the result.
The Trullo link isn’t the only reason we expect great things. In a moment of noble transparency, Burro is named after the Italian word for butter. The true reason restaurant food tastes so good is because of chefs’ extremely liberal use of this elemental ingredient, in quantities you wouldn’t dare replicate in your own kitchen, lest your arteries go on strike. Burro doesn’t care about your arteries, it cares about your tastebuds.
Tinned anchovy fillets with crostini and, naturally, a giant pad of butter, makes for a simple start. It’s perfectly nice to nibble on as I sip on Lambrusco, but not majorly noteworthy. That all changes with a silky, pine-nut heavy caponata packed with glossy aubergine, slippery peppers and tangy tomatoes. Heaven. Next is the most polarising dish on a menu of safe-bets; a thick slab of chicken liver toast. It quickly overpowers my offal-averse dining companion, but despite its deep grey colour (a colour you never really want your food to be) it’s surprisingly subtle, with an underlying hum of murky garlic majesty. Compared to everything else here, it’s a freaky dish, but in Venice, you’d have six-year-olds wolfing this down for breakfast.
Pasta is Trullo’s strong point, and it’s the same at Burro. Ribbons of yellow fettuccine are intertwined with a rich duck and porcini ragu, and showered with Parmesan. The mushroomy, meaty mix is as good as anything we’ve ever had at Trullo, and there’s a tell-tale trail of butter in the bottom of the bowl. Though the temptation to order more pasta is strong, we instead opt for a crab ‘acqua pazza’, an Italian bouillabaisse that translates as ‘crazy water’. Is it crazy to mix chunky mussels, nutty chickpeas, handfuls of fresh parsley and crumbled crab meat into a deep, salty broth? Never!
If you haven’t gone ham on pasta, you’ll have capacity for the tiramisu doughnuts, which are more like golf ball-sized churros, dusted in crunchy sugar and cinnamon, then stacked on a smudge of coffee cream. Perfect for sharing with mum - just like everything else at Burro.
The vibe Family-friendly, big room Italian dining in Covent Garden.
The food Pasta and trad classics from the same team as the best Italian restaurant in London, Trullo.
The drink A massive Italian wine list, a neat aperitivo selection and cocktails too.
Time Out tip The menu changes daily, but the fettuccine with duck and porcini ragu looks set to be mainstay. Order it.
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