As several major chains announce expansion plans, the march of the high street pasta and pizza outlet seems unstoppable. Is this great news for cash-strapped Britons? Or indicative of how the search for authentic Italian just got even harder
Up north, such is the popularity of a certain kind of identikit Italian restaurant (think smart designer looks and predictable pasta dishes), that webzine, Manchester Confidential, coined the acronym, YAFI, Yet Another Fucking Italian, for this epidemic. An epidemic that is not confined to Manchester.
This month, the national chain Prezzo posted profits of £17.3m; Glasgow's Papa Tony's announced ambitious expansion plans; that old stager, Carluccio's, the definition of neatly repackaged rustic Italian chic, reported a 15% profits boost, and a further 10 openings this year. Britain, it seems, can't get enough of Italian food. But what makes pizza, pasta and overpriced Peroni such a recession-proof restaurant formula?
Well, gnocchi and pasta alla puttanesca are relatively cheap to make, which keeps the prices affordable, and those dishes are fairly difficult to balls up. We might like Spanish food and flirt with Greek, but no one wants to eat a ropey paella or a dried-out kleftiko. Even a badly executed ragu over pasta, however, will be edible. Particularly when it costs less than a tenner. And we're familiar with it, but not too familiar. Italian food is simultaneously everywhere and yet, all that proscuitto and arancini still carries with it a residual whiff of continental sophistication.
And not just on the plate. The modern UK Italian restaurant embodies the success of "brand Italia": the repackaging of a nation as a chic, monochrome still from La Dolce Vita. The food – to varying degrees, inauthentic, Anglicised, pan-Italian – might not pass muster in Milan (although, in my limited experience of the city's aperitivo buffets, it might), but, with all their clean lines in glass, marble and leather, the British Italian certainly looks the part. Mix in a few handsome, black-shirted waiters, ready to flirt over the parmesan and pepper grinders, and you have the makings of what, for many, feels like a big, glamorous night out.
Those of you old enough to remember the original Italian trats (red-check tablecloths, candles in chianti bottles, olive oil from Boots, all that jazz), may think that the fact that you can now eat a passable bowl of ravioli in sage butter at Carluccio's a cause of celebration. In a way, it is. Were Peter Kay's dad still alive, he would, these days, be less likely foxed by garlic bread, than have a fondness for focaccia. But our understanding of Italian food has surely hit a glass and marble ceiling.
We may accept Italy as Europe's primary food nation, but the high street perception of that nation's cuisine is cheap and cheerful. The lower end of the market may be expanding, but outside London, only a limited number of restaurants – for example, York's Le Langhe, Da Piero on the Wirral, Scarborough's La Lanterna, La Locanda near Clitheroe – serve the kind of genuine, seasonal and/or regional-specific food that you might find in Italy. Even stumbling across somewhere with a wood-fired pizza oven can be a revelation.
We're not just reluctant pupils – how many people who regularly eat Italian food really want to know what 'nduja or guanciale are? We would also, I suspect, be unwilling to pay for them. I've felt this myself. I once ate at Firenze in Leicestershire – now a seafood restaurant, the Lighthouse. This was clearly "real" Italian food, but at around £20 for a main course, it couldn't help but feel expensive. Even though my main course of veal (like a very posh mixed grill; the only time I've eaten sweetbreads in an Italian) was brilliant. It's not an issue of quality, but how we perceive Italian food. It's rustic, peasant gear, right? The people's food? Ingredient-led, easy on the chef. How can it ever cost the best part of £100 for two?
Authentic Italian food needn't always cost that much, but you take my point. Britain may love Italian food, but does it value it? Will we ever evolve past the high street Italian? If so, where would you recommend we should eat? Or is that the wrong question? Instead, like the curry house, should we celebrate the British "Italian" as a bastardised standard bearer for affordable, democratic dining?
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