For years, I have had a bucket list of countries I want to visit, sampling the local cuisine as I go. Right at the top of that list is Italy! As a family, we have a shared passion for Italian food, whether it's a home made lasagne or a linguine carbonara served with freshly made bruschetta from our favourite restaurant, Italian dishes never fail to hit the spot in this house. So, when we were offered the chance to sample some authentic freshly made pasta and gelato, as well as sauces, imported directly from Italy, it was obvious we were going to jump at the chance.
Davi Artisans, based in Gateshead and run by Davide, originally from the city of Reggio di Calabria in southern Italy, offer a wide range of fresh and dry pasta, ravioli with some great fillings, oils and sauces imported from Italy and super tasty gelato, to finish your dish.
Were were kindly given the following
Ricotta & parmigiano ravioli
(We were in for a bit of a feast!)
The first dishes we decided to try out were the Smoked scamorza ravioli and the Orecchiette with puttanesca sauce. We added in some of our own, homemade garlic bread. The whole meal took less than 10 minutes from fridge to plate! The ravioli was amazing! In the past, we have had ravioli from restaurants and even tried making our own, but none of them compared to this. We served it drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and sprinkled with parmesan and it went down a treat. We decided to give the 2 younger boys smaller portions of the ravioli, as they both claim not to like peppers. Both of them ate it and asked for more, even when they found out about the peppers. They were also highly popular with the rest of us.
The orecchiette (or little ears) we served with the genuine Italian Puttanesca sauce (as recommended by Davide) and more parmesan. This was another one that we expected to be rebuked by the younger 2, due to the sauce containing anchovies, but again, it was extremely popular, with Toby telling us it was the best pasta sauce he had ever tasted. High praise from a self confessed fussy eater!
We followed the super tasty and super easy main course with the gelato. We had 2 flavours, chocolate and chocolate & hazelnut. Now anyone who knows Craig and the boys, knows that they all love ice cream and this gelato received good marks all round, with plenty of chocolatey flavour and a smooth texture. The chocolate & hazelnut was definitely the preferred choice of the two options.
We have frozen the rest of the pasta we received and have plans for another couple of meals over the coming weeks and will update this post then, but if what we have had so far is anything to go by, then it's safe to say, we will be becoming regular customers.
Overall, very good quality pasta, extremely tasty ravioli with some imaginative fillings that we can't wait to try more of and super tasty gelato to finish the meal.
For more information check out Davi's website http://www.davi-artisans.co.uk/
**We were kindly gifted these products in return for our honest review as part of this campaign**
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