In the beginning of the year, I stopped by the pizza food truck Monella and was very pleased when I saw that they offered pizza fritta ! This looked and tasted just like the ones that I have had on visits to Napoli (check out the review of the food truck here). We were also pleased when we heard that Monella was expanding and in November they opened a small trattoria in Stavanger Øst. We went there on a Friday night and it is small, intimate venue with about 25 seats and focus is on pasta and pizza – chef Simone is from Sicily and wants to showcase some of the delicacies from there!
We got some bruschetta to nibble on while checking the menu and decided to enjoy pasta this evening. They also offer something called pizzolo and this seems to be a focaccia dough baked, sliced and then a topping is added before it is put together again and, in the oven, again – so a sort of pizza sandwich! We shared a caponata to start with that was delicious! This is a Sicilian dish with fried eggplant, bell peppers, olive oil etc served with some bread. It was not that tricky to choose wine as at the moment they only have one red and one white on the menu – and Italian beers.
The pasta menu has some Sicilian specialties but there are also more known crowd pleasers such as carbonara, arrabbiata, ragu Bolognese etc. I decided to have the Sicilian Norma and Nikki had the misto mare (seafood pasta). My Norma was great with tomato sauce, fried aubergine and salty ricotta . Nikki was also pleased with her seafood pasta that included octopus, mussels and tomatoes.
The table was a bit small but we managed to balance our plates, wine and water while enjoying our food. There is always room for a dessert, and I had another dish that I associate from trips to Napoli: baba au rhum. This is a small cake saturated in a rum syrup and topped with whipped cream and pistachio cream and nuts.
Thanks for having us, Monella. We will be back to also try the pizza and of course the pizzolo. Grazie!
Pros: - intimate, Italian trattoria in Stavanger Øst
- focus on pasta and pizza
Cons: - very limited wine selection
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