Restaurant review: Agostini's full of decency and cheer

The space is large and when we say it's not overly noisy we're talking about the restaurant, because at the end of the room there's a bar spilling to an outside deck and there's loads of activity and noise from that direction. In fact, with the Kingo over the road and a club a block down, this unlikely corner of Canberra Avenue seems quite a hub of social activity in the evening. Kingston, it seems, is becoming stretched all the way from the waterfront, through the shopping centre to Canberra Avenue.

There's loads of small groups and families here tonight and the space works well for that without leaving you feeling lost in the crowd. There are odd pan-Mediterranean hanging ropes from the ceiling, which I guess you might find somewhere in coastal Italy, but which feel more Greek-themed to me. There's a Vespa parked by the kitchen, which is iconic Italy, of course, and cane chairs. The walls are pink and there are nostalgic fuzzy black and white drawings on the walls which bring that Italian romance to proceedings.

The menu is familiar - antipasto-style starters, pastas, a small list of meat-focused mains and pizzas. Having been persuaded to the frico on a previous visit, we're not game tonight. But don't let me dissuade you. It's essentially a little pan of fried cheese, apparently with layers of potato. Super rich, a little oily and a full-on indulgence.

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In the interests of variety we order instead the focaccia with whipped ricotta ($13). This feels like it captures our experience at Agostini's - generous and homemade, but a little unrefined and unexciting. The focaccia is large, pillowy and warm. The ricotta is creamy and bland, with black olives, preserved orange and friend capers adding flavour. The preserved orange turns out to be an orangey syrup, like marmalade, and reminds us of a favourite condiment in Tuscany, essentially a marmalade with spices and vanilla, which is eaten with cheese. Lovely.

House-made pizza bread is also offered, with cured meats or cheese or, in our case, whipped garlic butter ($12). We like this butter; it's sweet and good with the thin pizza breads.

Pappadelle all'anatra ($28) sounds good - a pasta with "12-hour slow-cooked duck", parsley and hazelnuts with pasta but it doesn't quite live up to its promise. The wide strips of homemade pasta are good and the serve is generous, like everything at Agostini's, but the sauce is a bit watery and doesn't adhere to the pasta, the shredded duck is not integrated and the onion pieces are a little out of place.

The gnocchi with tomato sugo, basil and smoked scamorza cheese ($26) is likewise a little weak, with flavour lost in this vegetable sauce.

We like the ravioli dish better. Ravioli with buffalo ricotta, spinach and lemon ($26) comes with quite a rich tomato sauce, crisped prosciutto, and a ricotta filling for the pasta. This would be our pick of the pastas tonight.

The "Zola" pizza ($24) we also like. It's thin, crisp and decent with its potato, rosemary and gorgonzola topping, if a little salty.

If you're feeling expansive and in the mood for capital M meat, you can have your fill from a menu that offers 300g strip steak, a 250g eye fillet wrapped in prosciutto, and a 1kg and T-bone, cooked rare with rosemary and sea salt, and served with salsa verde and mustard butter. It's a big hunk of meat, made for sharing, at $92.

The service is a plus. We are served by someone highly personable with loads of cheerfulness and decency.

And you will be happy to see the bambini menu also where you can feed the tribe for $16 each - a (very large) pasta, or pizza, a drink and gelato.

For dessert, we're now trawling the city's Italian haunts for the best cannoli and we've found the ones to beat at Bacaro. The cannoli here ($16) are reasonable although would be better with more special attention to the cream inside.

Summer meringue with passionfruit semifreddo, honeycomb and berries ($15) is a lovely light idea, although we'd like a little more sophistication in the semifreddo. It's pretty, served in a glass.

The wine list we like. They've made an effort, using the very good local Ravensworth winery to make their house wines, which means they are by definition food friendly, and especially Italian-food friendly. They've got a fiano, riesling and pinot grigio blend, named for "Nonna Lilia" and a barbera, sangiovese and nebbiolo blend named for "Nonno Beppo". There's also Mada and Helm by the glass, so they're choosing well. And everything is offered by the glass.

In sum, there's a lot to be said for a friendly reception and a buzzy atmosphere and a flexible relaxed menu, and that's pretty much what you'll find at Agostini's.

Address: East Hotel, 69 Canberra Ave, Griffith

Phone: 61780048

Hours: Seven days, lunch noon-3pm, dinner from 5.30pm.

Owners: Dan Bisa and Dion Bisa

Chef: Francesco Balestrieri

Vegetarian: Lots of options

Wheelchair access: Yes

Noise: Busy but not hard to hear