First Look: Italian and Sons’ new Focaccia Bar.
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Focaccia is not like other foods. It’s better.
And the Trimboli family—behind Canberra’s award-winning restaurants Mezzalira and Italian & Sons—believe their focaccia is the city’s best.
So confident are they in the crispy, oily, golden dough that comes straight from their imported-from-Napoli wood-fired oven using the original sourdough starter that they began their restaurant empire with in 1996, that they have devoted an entire menu to it.
This week, their dedicated wine-bar, Bacaro (located at the back of Italian and Sons on Lonsdale Street in Braddon) began a new life as a lunchtime Focaccia Bar, serving a range of lunch-time specials using 72-hour naturally risen sourdough, all baked in house.
Available between 11.30 am and 2.30 pm, the focaccias come hot out of the oven to be sliced and dressed with a selection of authentic Italian ingredients.
The Porchetta has wood-fired Berkshire Pork, rolled with rosemary and pancetta, salsa verde, watercress, mostarda and crema di cauliflower.
The Mortadella has pistachio mortadella, Stracciatella and crema di pistachio.
Vegetarians will love the Parmigiana with crumbed eggplant ‘in carozza’, provolone, tomato salsa, ricotta and basil.
There are seven choices in all, which you can choose to eat in or take away, priced between $16-$20.
If you can score a seat beside the open fire, you may want to supplement the focaccia with a glass of wine off a bespoke wine list and finish lunch with aplomb by choosing Italian and Son’s notoriously famous tiramisu (Lord knows, we did…).
Pasquale Trimboli, the restaurant’s co-owner and resident focaccia dough expert, says it made sense to offer the rest of Canberra the sort of authentic Italian lunch that he and his brothers favour above all other things.
“It’s what we eat, it’s what we love, we cook focaccia every day and our oven gives it that magic special touch.”
As the team has been nailing down the filling options, Pasquale has fallen in love with the Funghi, which has porcini, portobello and pine mushrooms, slathered with Reggiano, watercress and crema di ricotta al’ tartufo.
“They are all good, but this is my favourite.”
And if you’ve stayed away from focaccia because of a gluten-intolerance, Pasquale and his team have perfected a gluten-free focaccia, baked daily from the wood fired oven, they say is every bit as good as the original.
It means, for a quick lunch at a fair price, you can share in a little bit of that Italian and Sons romance (so romantic that our Prime Minister Anthony Albanese chose it as the restaurant for his recent pre-proposal dinner to long-time partner Jodie Haydon).
The Focaccia Bar will be open three days a week with the Trimboli Group planning to deliver similar focaccia lunchtime specials from Mezzalira’s hole-in-the-wall pizzicheria on London Circuit from Spring 2024.
THE ESSENTIALS
What: Italian and Sons Focaccia Bar – entry via the lane way
Where: 7 Lonsdale Street Braddon
When: 11.30 am to 2.30 pm, Wednesday to Friday
Web: italianandsons.com.au