Reykjavík Grapevine - 13.07.2012, Síða 66

F D
For your mind, body and soul
Whales are being killed to feed tourists
Don’t let your visit leave a bad taste in your mouth
…means that the moon has collided with
earth killing all of mankind and similes
about pizza pies are the least of your
worries!
The status of Italian food in Iceland
has long been dire and I find it unlikely
to change as Italian food is not particu-
larly fashionable at the moment. Your
average young person (AYP) is more
likely to seek out sushi or ceviche than
splurge on the pasta they’ve been mak-
ing at home the whole week. Personally,
I haven’t been that interested in Italian
food lately unless we’re talking about
Ancient Roman cuisine (fattened dor-
mice, boiled lupin, snails with fish sauce
and spiced date wine are all overdue for
a comeback!). La Luna goes some way
towards addressing the situation but not
far enough to find new converts.
So I decided to take my thirteen-year-
old pasta fan of a nephew along for the
ride. Both of us had a bit of a laugh at the
menu which, despite La Luna labelling
itself as a simple family-run trattoria,
had the most ridiculously over-wrought
meal descriptions that wouldn’t look
out of place in a Mad Men print ad.
And the TV ads La Luna have been run-
ning aren’t exactly helping (same copy
delivered in a ludicrous Italian accent).
But the crazy thing is that the location
could actually live up to those descrip-
tions. La Luna is situated in a beautiful
old brewery on the east side of town and
sports an iron fireplace, a hundred year
old safe, thick stone walls and beautiful
spiral staircase leading up to a bronze
dome. Again the details work against
them as the faux-antiques and pulp nov-
els that litter the place are letting the gor-
geous interiors down.
After watching my nephew down
six whiskey sours in the first half hour I
decided we better order the first course
before he’d pass out (I’m kidding, but
we did go through four bottles of water,
which is nuts).
We started with the antipasto for two
(1,990 ISK), which consisted of a so-so
prosciutto, some type of salamio pic-
cante, parmigiano shavings, a tapenade
and a cold creamy mushroom sauce
and a few thin slices of dry bread. The
creamy sauce was the tastiest thing in
there—otherwise I’d recommend the
charcuiterie at Hótel Marína instead.
La Luna do serve “paddella pasta”
(padella pasta), which is a pan of pasta
to be shared by the table but my nephew
and I had different ideas and he decided
to have the tagliatelle al mare (frutti di
mare) and I had the “pizza marinera”
(pizza ai frutti di mare—“pizza mari-
nera” has nothing to do with seafood last
I checked) but seeing as the restaurant
hadn’t had seafood on offer for over a
week (according to the waiter), I settled
on a lobster pizza (2,490 ISK) and the
nephew switched grudgingly to the spa-
ghetti con polpette (1,990 ISK).
The spaghetti con polpette was all
right, the meatballs were tiny and fla-
vourful but the pasta did not taste par-
ticularly fresh and the sauce could have
used another hour on the stove.
The pizza was actually quite good—
made in a proper wood burning pizza
oven. It was a nice, thin Lazio pizza with
plenty of artichoke and not too much oil.
It definitely seems the pizza is the way to
go at La Luna.
For dessert we had the “Apple adven-
ture” (1,790 ISK), which was a two-layer
pie with a thin layer of applesauce and
too much cinnamon topped with scoops
of ice cream. The kid had his heart set
on vanilla ice cream, but again they were
in short supply so he decided on a tasty
and toffee-like lemon ice cream, which
regrettably did not go well with the apple
pizza. Chunks of freshly baked apples,
less cinnamon and a sweeter crust
might have saved the apple pizza.
I had the “Chocolate chocolate,”
which was the long plate with three
types of chocolate we see in so many
restaurants in Iceland these days: lava
cake, chocolate ice cream and a tough
peanut brownie served with a frosted
glass of whole milk (1,390 ISK). We both
agreed that the inclusion of the milk was
a stroke of genius and something every
restaurant in Iceland should take up.
Overall it was a pretty good dessert and
moderately priced.
The service left something to be de-
sired. We took a table in a nook by a cast
iron stove, which seemed to cause fre-
quent bouts of amnesia in the kitchen.
Almost an hour went by between fin-
ishing the main course and the dessert,
and the waiter seemed disinterested and
shot us suspicious glances (we did build
a little castle out of cutlery while we were
waiting but we put it all back—prom-
ise!).
RAGNAR EGILSSON
ALÍSA KALYANOVA
WHEn tHE Moon Hits
your fAcE…
What We Think: Beautiful loca-
tion, over-the-top copy, good
pizzas, dull pasta
Flavour: Italian (but need to get
their terminology right)
Ambiance: Chill, romantic
Service: They will swaddle you
like a newborn
Price for 2 (with drinks):
12–15,000
La Luna
Rauðarárstígur 37, 105 Reykjavík