da Mario Pizzeria

Da Mario's special calamari rings ($16++) which were very soft and chewy, with a golden and crispy breaded crust. The tartare sauce was very tasty - there's a hint of garlic in it so it's extremely yummy when eaten together with the piping hot breaded calamari rings.

Pizza bianca - It comes with a nice pungent cheese, salty green olives, flakes of crab, artichoke hearts and a sprinkle of chilli flakes. The pizza base was thin, crispy but with enough thickness to make it taste like a pizza and not like a chapati. I liked how the salty olives went with the sweet crab flakes, and the flavourful cheese. I'll definitely try their other Pizza Biancas again if I come back.
Foie gras pasta ($23) - this is artery clogging to the max. Fatty liver with buttery sauce is a lethal combination. It's definitely not the best foie gras I've tasted, but to give the chef credit, it's 2 fat pieces of foie gras, seared lightly. This was my favourite pasta for the night. I suppose that this would be really too rich to have all by yourself, but it's perfect for sharing.

Spaghetti al Cartoccio - sauted with squids, scallops, prawns, clams, mussels in tomato, garlic and white wine sauce, baked in foil ($23++)

Not very impressive - I found the tomato sauce tangy and refreshing, but it was too watery for my liking. Though the many pieces of seafood (about 3 prawns, lots of mussles and clams) makes it pretty worth it.

Squid ink pasta ($18++) - this wasn't very good. It wasn't very tasty, and the squid ink was just gritty. I have conculded that I don't quite like squid ink pasta.
The pasta that I wanted to order, but it wasn't available. I think their cheese wheel must have broken down.

Tiramisu - good sized portion, but it wasn't alcoholic enough, and I felt that the mascarpone cheese and cream layer wasn't as rich as I would have liked it to be.

Service here was a bit slow - 4 of us shared all the dishes, and there was an incredibly long break between the arrival of the pizza and the first pasta and the other 2 pastas. In fact, it was so long that we finished the first 2 dishes before they served the rest of the dishes. They serve iced water, but the staff seem very harrassed and don't seem to be able to cope with the customer load, and our glasses were perpetually unfilled.

If I come back, I'll go and try the other pizza biancas - pretty hard to find pizza biancas around, and the pizza base is the kind that I like - thin but thick enough to chew on.

da Mario Pizzeria

60 Robertson Quay

#01-05/06 The Quayside

Tel: 6235 7623