VANTO - SYDNEY CBD
Vanto
1/455 George St
Queen Victoria Building
Sydney CBD
Italian in the CBD was the order of the day - for a quick meal without a reservation and on a Friday night. After an initial panic we started searching - online of course - to see what was near us. Vanto wasn't the first place we spotted but it looked interesting and it had the added advantage of being inside the beautiful Queen Victoria Building. We just love the charm, style and feel of it there.
We both wanted a simple pasta dish for dinner. With this in mind Mlady chose the tagliatelle ai porcini cacio e pepe. The last time we had the rich bitey sauce of cacio e pepe was a month ago in Rome. It's so good with a thick pasta. Mlady enjoyed this dish and the fact that it filled her as well.
The combination of seafood and pasta often grabs Sir. Tonight was no different and he selected the linguina di gragnano calamari e bottarga - a mouthful of a name and a good sized dish also. This linguini dish came with calamari, zucchini, crunchy lemon breadcrumb and bottarga (a caviar like salted fish roe). He thoroughly enjoyed this dish and commented on the great combination of flavours and textures.
Of course pasta needs a glass of wine with it. We had a pleasant chianti which combined nicely with our hearty pasta dishes.
Vanto is quite a sprawling place with "indoor" and "outdoor" areas. The "outdoor" areas are in fact outside the restaurant but still inside the Queen Victoria building on level 1. The internal views are of course lovely as it is a spectacular building. Despite being away from the main street and much of the traffic, Vanto is a busy place that gets a good trade. We enjoyed our dishes and would gladly revisit to sample more of the menu.