San Carlo restaurants are well known for focussing on quality ingredients and regional Italian cooking, offering customers a chance to experience more authentic dishes from smaller localities. This week’s Bottega menu features specialities particular to Venice and Verona, along with prosecco and recommended regional wines such as Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio and Amarone.

But even when tasted with a smile, because the name’s so bizarrely off-the-wall you really kind-of have to love it… Equally so if Highlander Caledonian Tomato was a Muhammad Ali among crisps. The Greatest of All Time. In addition to this special menu, lunchtime customers dining on Thursday 6th October from 12.30pm will be accompanied by a harp and flute duo from the Royal Northern College of Music.

Best potato chips: Amica Chips

ing destination features a hand carved stone bar, imported from Italy, perfect for enjoying a pre dinner drink. Filippo told us: “For me, the best cooking combines great simplicity with great taste and for an Italian, eating seasonally is a way of life, it means you’re eating fresh ingredients at the height of their flavour. In June and July, asparagus, peas, broad beans, peaches and lemons come into their own. Our new dishes celebrate the best of the new season’s produce using dishes from Florence, Cortina, Venice and Abruzzo.” But is it any good? Or is it all just style over substance? We headed along for a spot of lunch to find out... San Carlo has brought quality, originality, and style to the world of Italian crisps. It’s the largest Italian chips brand in the sector, and it’s always launching new lines of products to suit the consumers’ tastes. San Carlo has also introduced innovative production technologies, to obtain light, crispy and gluten-free potato chips.

Italian born Zilli, Executive Consultant Chef for San Carlo group of eighteen award winning UK restaurants, jetted in to Birmingham from his birth place in Abruzzo, Italy, with a rare white winter truffle on Friday 28th October. There is a strong link between Shakespeare and Italy, with many of his most famous plays being set in the country; the tragic love story of Romeo and Juliet, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Julius Caesar and The Merchant of Venice, to name a few. So it didn’t take much persuasion to get San Carlo’s Executive development chef, Filippo Pagani, who hails from Venice, on board with the idea of showcasing some special native dishes. For mains I plumed for the lobster pasta. This is the signature dish here and has been for over a decade. If I had to eat nothing else but this meal 3 times a day for the coming decade I'd be a happy man. Perfectly cooked fresh pasta, huge meaty chunks of lobster and a rich tomato sauce topped off with a little cream. This is what living and eating out is all about. Forget the gluten-free trends, the vegan desserts and the clean eating. When I go out and treat myself I want something like this lobster dish. An absolute triumph cooked and served by true professionals. AUTHENTIC is a word much abused. Seasonal, too. And Italian restaurants that pay true attention to regionality are few and far between. Glossy San Carlo Cicchetti has never stayed tied for long to its name, a homage to Venetian gondoliers’ favourite small plates but in exec development chef Filipp This is set by Hotjar to identify a new user’s first session. It stores a true/false value, indicating whether this was the first time Hotjar saw this user. It is used by Recording filters to identify new user sessions.Those who crave heartier fayre to match the onset of autumn will need to rush over to experience ultimate Italian comfort food like Gnocchi coated with butter, sage and Monte Veronese cheese, a cow’s milk cheese which San Carlo had flown over especially. The gnocchi is served here in an edible cheese and breadcrumb basket. Bell Italia is the wholesaler that brings the best of made in Italy to the whole world. Over 20 thousand products of the best brands are available on our price list at super affordable prices. We also offer our partners constant support concerning the necessary certifications, relabelling, and logistics. There are many good reasons why wholesalers, retailers and importers from all over the world choose Bell Italia every day. Take what we Brits refer to as Crisps. Or what the Yanks, in their never-ending state of terminal food confusion, call Potato Chips. In 1970, the company adopted the name San Carlo Gruppo Alimentare and moved its head office to via Turati. You've probably heard of the Manchester institution that is San Carlo. There doesn't seem to be a day that goes by without a celebrity or football player being photographed leaving the popular Italian restaurant.

The years of the economic boom and the generational change were those in which the company PAI was founded. Indeed, in that prosperous Italy of the first summer getaways, of FIAT 500, of the first miniskirts, and of Carosello, P.A.I. (Prodotti Alimentari Industriali – “Industrial foodstuffs”) was born in Novara. That was the beginning of a story of fragrances and flavoured crisp which accompanied the Italians until the present time. It’s one of the world’s truly great cuisines. But perhaps the stellar heights achieved by a perfect Spaghetti alla Carbonara; or Ossobucco; or Bistecca alla Fiorentina can begin to explain why, in a kind of strange inverse ratio, Italian junk food is…well…junk. cess and expertise to his ongoing work with Flying Pizza, part of the award winning San Carlo Group of Italian restaurants, where he works with the Group’s executive chefs. So far so good, as setting aside the hoary old Scottish food gags about Haggis; Deep-Fried Mars Bars and…er…deep-fried anything in fact, Scottish food can be incredibly fine: the world’s best salmon and game; Angus beef; and, yes, even Haggis. And while Highlander Crisps have been absent for a decade now in Scotland, the brand continues to dominate the flavoured crisp market in a country famous for its gelato, pizza and pasta.

San Carlo crisps: the figures in Italy and abroad

It was one of the first Italian restaurants to open in the city and was a regular haunt for footballers, television stars and politicians. In short if you are famous, good at sport or have plenty of cash then San Carlo is probably the first place you are going to end up getting a bit of grub in Manchester. So a humble nettle risotto, peasant food, is given a showcase in the new summer menu and beetroot ravioli are given equal billing – a quite ravishing dish, sprinkled with poppy seeds, not a million miles away from Polish pierogi. So these crisps are made with fresh, ripe, juicy Scottish tomatoes from the sun-kissed hills, glens and mountains ? hite truffle, so highly prized it’s known as the king of the culinary world. The edible buried treasure was discovered by professional truffle hunters in the national park of the Abruzzo region using specially trained dogs.

I’m passionate about produce, using the best seasonal ingredients and allowing them to shine is what great Italian cooking is all about – which county in the UK could be better to share this passion with than YORKSHIRE? I love it, you have the best regional produce – from vegetables and fruit to your wild boar, rabbit and trout, the possibilities excite me and marry perfectly with our food and that’s what we’re showcasing at Flying Pizza this weekend.” We were treated to an extensive menu expertly cooked and served by Aldo, who talked us through some of the regional ingredients and how he incorporated them into the Italian dishes. Aldo handed over the delicacy, as a welcome gesture, to old friend Carmine Sacco of San Carlo in Birmingham and diners at the popular Temple Street restaurant will be able to try the world’s most expensive food for themselves.In 1940, Mr Vitaloni moved to Greco, to start production on a larger scale, with the company changing its name into "San Carlo... le patatine". As it happens, the Scottish factory was closed in 2013, with all production transferred to Italy. This is why you rarely find Highlander crisps in Scotland any more… Reply