There’s a new ‘playfully’ Italian eating experience in George Street and it brings a vibrant menu of small plates developed with the help of authentic Italian family recipes. Emma Clegg pays a visit and discovers a liking for pizzetta.
When you have fond memories of being served up steaming bowls of pasta by your Italian grandmother as children, and you have some of those warming and delicious family recipes in your possession, you have a ready-made home culinary repertoire to impress your visitors. Take this a stage further, as brothers Mike and Matthew Lisanti have done, and you can create a restaurant to showcase those coveted Italian family dishes and share them with others. Manja Manja is the result. (Although the brothers do say that their Italian aunts were reluctant to relinquish the recipes, and had to be persuaded by being plied with glasses of wine!).
This family business offers a menu that it describes as ‘playfully Italian’, drawing from the classic roots of the country’s cuisine and layering it with modern interpretations. The restaurant clearly takes pride in the process of cooking fresh, high-quality food, with every ingredient, apart from the charcuterie, made on site, including the pasta.
After entering the expansive interior you first encounter the wine bar, incorporating the location’s original elaborate mahogany bank counter, which then opens out into a series of separate dining areas (offering around 85 covers), decorated in multiple warming shades of orange, apricot, peach and pale sunshine.
The wine offering is significant and impressive. The main wine list, developed by general manager Jessie Warlow and Kate Selley of wine wholesaler and importer Enotria and Co, consists mainly of classic Italian and French wines (we sampled the 2021 Cerasuolo di Vittoria Organic, Planeta, Italy). The guest wine list on the board behind the bar specialises in the wines of independent companies, featuring bottles of wine with characterful, distinctive palates from small vineries in countries including Georgia, Spain, France, Portugal, Sicily and South Africa. The Ori Marani Rosé from Georgia, for example, including the flavours of hibiscus and rhubarb, only ever produced 800 bottles.
Of the owner/director brothers, Matthew is the food expert, and was for five years head chef of their other, much-loved, food destination, Circus Restaurant in Brock Street. Matthew and head chef Fraser Scott have developed the Manja Manja menu together. The dishes are designed around plates for sharing, with groupings for cicchetti (small plates), pizzetta (small pizza), sharing boards, sharing bowls and sides, with plates not necessarily all arriving at the same time.
We were advised to select between two and three dishes per person, depending on how hungry we were. Our multi-sharing selection consisted of Glazed Lamb Sausage, Camellia Bean and Pomegranate (£12); Flat Iron Steak, Umami Fava Bean Glaze, Cabbage Crudo (£12); Salt Cod Croquettes, Roasted Garlic and Red Pepper Jam (£10); Burrata, Fermented Carrot, Honey and Pistachio (£8); Beetroot, Radicchio, Walnuts and Blood Orange (£7); and Goat’s Cheese, Roasted Grape Walnut Dressing Pizzetta (£9).
Any recipe with four sets of double letters is bound to be impressive and the Beetroot, Radicchio, Walnuts and Blood Orange Salad certainly was, with its colourful and refreshing combination of golden and red beetroots, juicy blood orange segments, green radicchio and walnuts. I’d not encountered pizzetta before, but I’m now a dedicated fan – at least of Manja Manja’s – with the sourdough base providing a light, crusty foundation for its tasty bed of goat’s cheese and green grape. The Salt Cod Croquettes topped with glistening baked tomatoes, the tender and delicious mini slices of flat iron steak, the creamy burrata with carrot, and the Glazed Lamb Sausage were all superb as part of our communal melange. Other menu choices included sharing charcuterie meat or cheese boards served with a selection of pickles, chutneys and bread and sharing bowls with pasta options featuring risotto, casarecce and lasagne.
We finished with more Italian character (and an unwillingness to share) with the Affogato with Madagascan Vanilla and Espresso and Tiramisu, Coffee Caramel and Chocolate Salami (the latter made with chocolate truffle with nuts).
The menu is deliberately simple, and caters for vegetarian, vegan, dairy-free and gluten free. The service was attentive, friendly and efficient and the atmosphere was warm and wholesome with an upmarket casual vibe. There is a high chance of us returning to experiment further with the Italian small plates experience…
Open Monday – Sunday 12pm–3pm and 5pm–11pm. Manja Manja, 8–9 George Street, Bath BA1 2EH; manjamanja.co.uk