Pasto’s Grill

Order the gnocchi at Pasto's Grill and it arrives in a shallot and gorgonzola cream, not the red sauce an Italian grill's name might lead you to expect. That one substitution says most of what matters about the kitchen on the Wellington Road South side of London: it works inside familiar Italian territory but rarely settles for the shorthand version of it. The menu reads as a full Italian grill — antipasti, pasta, thin-crust pizza and panzerotti, oven-and-grill mains, vegan plates, lunch sandwiches, and a children's menu — and the breadth is the whole idea. A table here does not have to agree on one thing before it sits down.

The opening moves are unfussy and built for sharing. Calamari Fritti comes flash-fried with a garlic aioli instead of buried under sauce, and the Bruschetta arrives on toasted garlic crostini with Parmesan and a balsamic reduction. Then the pasta, which is the centre of gravity. The Chicken & Sausage Penne is the clearest read on the house style — Italian sausage and grilled chicken with roasted red peppers in a tomato-basil rosé sauce, hearty without tipping into heavy. Around it sits a deeper bench: Butternut Squash Ravioli in a chipotle cream with spinach, a Seafood Linguine of shrimp, scallops, and clams in a lobster cream sauce, and a Shrimp Diavolo that carries real heat.