Gino D’Acampo – My Restaurant Review

Having watched him on TV and read a couple of his books, I was very excited when I first heard Gino was opening a restaurant in Manchester city centre. Located in the newly refurbished Manchester Corn Exchange, Gino opened the doors to his restaurant in December 2015 and every time I pass it seems to be as busy as the opening week.

We have visited here twice now, once in January with the family and once again as a couple in March. Both times we have been greeted and welcomed in true Italian style, that is with open arms and a smile.

The first time we visited Gino’s, my partners mum had asked for the lasagne for her main course but was told that they had run out, it was only 1:30pm so we were a little surprised that they had sold out so quickly, but we were even more surprised when Gino himself appeared alongside our table and asked if everything was alright. After the girlfriends mum had gotten over the initial shock of seeing Gino by our table, she jokingly said “no, its not alright, as I wanted lasagne but apparently its sold out”, that’s when Gino squeezed himself in on our table and explained that all of the food is made fresh on the day and they don’t keep any dishes whatsoever on hand on the freezer like other restaurants, names he didn’t mention for obvious reasons. Gino stayed chatting with us for a while and even had his picture taken with us, the looks on the other customers faces were a mixture of surprise and confusion, “who were these people Gino was sitting with, were they also celebrities?” We needn’t have felt too special though as once he left us, he did the rounds with many of the other customers, a very nice touch. Gino was also in the restaurant during our second visit; he was sat eating his lunch with friends but left his food on numerous occasions to have his picture taken with fans, not once did he look annoyed or fed up with it. A genuinely nice guy.

The food at Gino’s is delicious. On our first visit we had the calamari, mussels, spicy brocolli bruschetta and king prawn bruschetta for starters and everything was deliciously fresh, especially the prawns and the mussels. The bruschetta was thick and crispy and grilled to perfection. A word of warning, the spicy brocolli is quite  spicy!

For main courses we chose linguine seafood, linguine with king prawns, herby veal meatballs and sea bass. The linguine seafood was out of this world, stuffed with calamari, prawns and clams and topped with a giant langoustine, again the prawns were huge and incredibly juicy. The meatballs were bubbling in their sauce when they arrived at the table and even though my girlfriends dad was warned not to touch the dish, he accidentally did so and it was as hot as the food it contained. The meatballs were tender and seasoned perfectly and the parmesan and tomato sauce was delicious, the only complaint was there wasn’t enough brushcetta to mop up all the sauce.

We only had one dessert as we were all full from our meal. For drinks, we had two Aparol spritz, three glasses of red wine a large sparkling water and two coffees.

The total bill came to £104, which I personally think is very reasonable.

Prior to our visit we had signed up online for the My Club card http://ginodacamporestaurants.com/myrestaurant/my-club/ which gives you reward points each time you dine at Gino’s My Restaurant, Piccolino, The Restaurant Bar & Grill and Bank Restaurant & Bar. There was also an offer on in January which gave you 50% back on your total food bill. This meant for the £104 we spent on our first visit, we received a total of £70 credit on our My Club card, what an amazing deal. That is why we decided to visit again so soon after our first visit, although I am sure we would have visited again in any case because the place is so good.

On our second visit, it was just me and the girlfriend, again we were greeted in typical Italian fashion with a loud and friendly “Bonjourno!” We were taken to the bar area where we ordered a couple of drinks and were told our table wouldn’t be long. We were shown to our table within ten minutes or so.

This time we chose the Tre Cicchetti sharing platter for starters, which comprised of two pieces each of crispy cod, king prawns, courgette and fennel on toasted ciabatta. All of them were delicious but it was the prawns that stole the day again, just so large and tasty. There was more than enough for two people, so much so, that we both felt rather full before our main course arrived, linguine with fresh crab and a diavoletto pizza. The pizza was thin and crispy and topped with salami, buffalo mozarella, tomato, grilled peppers and onion, although I enjoyed it, the onion just didn’t do it for me, there was too much and it just didn’t seem to fit with the rest of the ingredients. As for the linguine, again it was very tasty and there was plenty of crab meat, there’s no skimping at Gino’s, lets hope it stays this way.

Again, we didn’t opt for a dessert as we were too full from the starter and main courses. The total price for a two course lunch with one Aparol spritz and a large sparkling water was approximately £40, paid for with our My Card loyalty points, leaving us with around £30 towards our next visit. Even without the loyalty points we would still definitely return to Gino’s My Restaurant. It is one of my favourite places to eat right now.