Address: 23 Boon Tat St, Singapore 069621

Cuisine: Italian

Nearest MRT: Telok Ayer (Downtown Line) or Raffles Place (North-South, East-West line interchange)

No Menu is a family-style Italian restaurant located in a cozy shophouse at Boon Tat Street. The owner Osvaldo chose this location because of its setting exactly between the heritage of Chinatown and the modern Business district.

When you step inside the restaurant, you will feel as though you have entered Osvaldo’s home, surrounded by a living gallery of music heirlooms, pictures and keepsakes from their house in Italy. Everything here tells a story of the family’s journey.

As the name of the restaurant suggests, there is no menu to place your orders, so be prepared to be surprised by the chef. The degustation menu has a selection of multiple tasting portions from the seasonal market, simple and fresh, while the succulent a la carte selection offer something for your distinct cravings. Of course there would be a menu as standby in case you prefer to choose your own dishes and read more about the ingredients in each dish.

The dishes served at No Menu are created from recipes that have been passed down for many generations in the family. Every dish is prepared to highlight the fresh, prime ingredients that help maintain the integrity of their rich culinary tradition.

Being adventurous, we decided to go for the sample portion which has 4 courses, priced at $108++ per person.

For starters, we were served warm homemade focaccia bread with a general dose of olive oil which I enjoyed. There was also spicy salami spread which can be used to pair with the focaccia bread.

Next, we had fresh mozarella chesse served with cherry tomatoes, baby spinach and parmaham. The parmaham was served on top of a slice of peach which made it slightly sweet and enhanced its taste.

A primo is the first course. It consists of hot food and is usually heavier than the antipasto, but lighter than the second course. For the primo, we had a sample platter of ravioli, spaghetti and risotto.

The risotto was undercooked and we did not enjoy it. The freshly made spaghetti was very delicious and the ravioli was stuffed with veal cheek which was tender and marinated in brown sauce. The waiter asked if we wanted cheese, then proceeded to shave a generous portion of cheese on top of our dish using his handheld machine. We were intrigued.

For the main course, my wife had the slow cooked beef with mashed potato. The dish may look simple but the beef was really tender and packed a punch. The sauce drizzled on it seeped into the creamy potato.

For me, I had the snapper with lemon butter sauce served on a bed of baby spinach, cherry tomatoes and enoki mushroom. The creamy butter sauce complimented the freshness of the fish which still retained it juiciness as it was pan fried for the right amount of time.

Then, the chef came out to surprise us with desserts and insisted that we took a photo holding each other’s hands. We were celebrating our 2nd year anniversary, so I had called in earlier to ask them to surprise us.

For desserts, we had tiramisu, apple cake and panna cotta. All of which were traditional Italian desserts and done perfectly. We loved the tiramisu with a hint of kahlua and the panna cotta had a strong vanilla taste. The apple cake was slightly sour but the pastry sweetened the overall taste.

The surprise set meal cost $108++ per person. It was really filling even though the portions seemed small. The service at the restaurant was impeccable, they kept checking on us and topped up our glasses of water. They did not look down on us even though we did not order the wine. The wine was at least $80 and above per bottle. However, what spoilt our night at this restaurant was the blackout and intermittent electricity supply, so we waited half an hour for the bill. Being exasperated, I decided to go down to the first floor to make payment and momentarily, the cashier till was working and was able to accept my card payment, after which it died down again. I pity the other diners who had to dine under candle light and deal with the lights going on and off. Strangely it happened only to No Menu, as other restaurants along the same street did not seem to have the same issue.