san carlo

i lived in birmingham during the autumn of 2010, andsancarlo was my favorite dining experience in the city. the front of house, took my coat and sat me immediately, despite me 1) having no reservation, 2) being a 21 year old, and 3) dining alone. as an american from the south, i had never seen italian fare like this. it was more than i had prepared, and i enjoyed every second of it.

i visitedsancarlo with my dad nearly two years back. this place is very centrally located; it falls to your right as you walk down temple st. towards new street rail station. it overlooks this beautiful georgian baroque cathedral which i have always admired. to give you an idea of how savvy the place is, i would of course, have to tell you about the brilliant old joint stock just a stones throw away. whats more, there are top firms like wragge lawrence graham & co situated opposite of this restaurant. so, yes, its a savvy place indeed. 

anyhow, as you enter the restaurant it strikes to you how modern looking this restaurant is. not typical of italian restaurants which usually try to keep the charm alive from the 'old country'. when i visited it, i had a strange feeling that it was slightly over staffed but then again it was 2 years back.

we had made prior booking even though, the place at time was not seeing much crowd. we were shown a table promptly after checking ourselves in. we had 'agnello alla toscana', which is essentially a lamb dish. now, i have to tell you before being critical that the meat itself tasted fabulous! lamb was fresh and succulent. further, in the name of 'being top notch' it wasn't one of those restaurants which knowingly keeps the centre of the meat intentionally undercooked. 

the garnishing i wasn't so happy with. i think the chef had been a tad too liberal with the capers. now, many would tell you as i am telling you now that capers are an acquired taste, they don't in themselves make a dish taste superb. its like your love for vat69, its an acquired love. capers taste salty, piquant and stronger and more peculiar than cayenne pepper. the smell too is sort of strange and they leave a sharp salty after taste. i believe that liberal hand with capers was a turn off for me.

the use of parsley was masterful, i have always found coriander a tad too overpowering. i guess i liked the dish all in all but the capers are the reason why i would be pushing down my rating.

well, that and the staff. the staff seemed a tad sleepy and nonchalant. i think there was one waiter who seemed more proficient with the menu and with the knowledge of the ingredients therein but the younger staff did not have the finesse or the knowledge to handle the more discerning customers. 

certainly worth a visit nonetheless.

i bloody love cheese. hard, soft, stinky, mild, cow or goat – i don’t discriminate. and now that winter has officially rolled in, i have no shame calling out for cheese in every meal. luckilysancarlo have my back, rolling out a special menu dedicated to cheese – grana padano in particular – which will run throughout the whole of november.

my daughter and i went tosancarlo on new years day my daughter had booked a table for 3.30pm it was very busy when we got there .we were asked if we had booked and we said yes there were three people in front of us who had not booked and were given a table .my daughter and i were sent downstairs and had to wait 20 minutes then we were seated downstairs .the attitude of the staff there was not good the only person  that seemed to bother was the lady taking the money.will be a long time before i go there again i was appalled at the service.

we have been usingsancarlo and flying pizza every week in leeds and manchester for years. it so happened we were in birmingham yesterday 11/11/2017 and we thought lets try thesancarlo. we walked in and the waiter had a really bad attitude and he was very rude.  we walk out straight away

i had visited the infamoussancarlo fumo restaurant in birmingham. fumo introduces italian tapas style dishes that are delicious in relation to their main restaurantsancarlo. located in the centre of birmingham and only a few minutes fromsancarlo, this makes fumo easily accessible for anybody to find!

at first glance, i recall that the interior was w o w. really elegant and modern, with an overview of the bar area within the dining area. we ordered a few dishes as this was during lunch-time. (and cocktails - come'on it was a birthday celebration lunch! :p)

so this is what we ate:
* lobster risotto: despite it being a small dish, we hoped that there would be lobster meat in this, however it was really nice rich in lobster flavour.
* mixed seafood calamari: squid / king prawn / scallops. i loooove calamari and this was certainly delicious! this was the first time i had tried deep fried scallops and it's definitely something i would order again.
* mixed seafood spaghetti: contains mussels / prawns / clams / squid and cherry tomatoes. this portion size was just right especially for lunch as pasta can be really filling. the creamy sauce that had garlic, butter and a kick of chilli made this dish really flavorsome.
* bruschetta with wild mushrooms: your ordinary bruschetta dish, plated on a bed of rocket leaf salad, with wild mushrooms topped with parmesan cheese. tasted lovely, wouldn't say extra-ordinary though.
* calamari: deep fried squid. yep, we loved the mixed calamari soo much that we had ordered another portion of just squid calamari. love the presentation of this.
* rice balls with meat ragu: bet you would've thought that these were meatballs right? definitely looks it! take a bite into this and you would find that it has a risotto filling with meat ragu inside. soo yummy! i loved it.


cocktails: i cannot remember at all what were the names of these! but i do remember that it tasted alot stronger than i had imagined. nevertheless, tasted really fresh and different! fumo really does like to showcase their uniqueness in presentation. how cute is that little glass :o). overall, we thoroughly enjoyed lunch atsancarlo fumo, the service was great as was the food. with no doubt, we will be back to have dinner one day.

to see all the mouth watering photos please visit our blog http://prettyandtasty-ly.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/san-carlo-fumo.html

great fish. a friend was visiting from the states who was a fish lover so had to take her tosancarlo.

we chose from the chilled counter in the entrance and ate a delightful dover sole. she had prawns which were cooked to perfection in a light creamy sauce.

the service was a little fast but attentive and we didn't have to wait for anything at any time.

a must for visitors to the city!