Great Eating Hole
This year, 2003, will be our third in Sorrento and already we are planning how many visits we can fit into our schedule!

Last year we paid three visits and found this to be one of the best restaurants we have eaten in.

You need to look out for the Tasso as the entrance is between two shops, a small corridor leads up a few steps into the body of the restaurant. The furnishings are very comfortable and the whole of the floor area is covered part by ceiling of the building and part by a (removable in fine weather) tented affair.

The staff are extremely attentive but not to an annoying degree and very knowledgeable about the menu. The Maitre 'D speaks very good English and worked London for a time. The dress code is, for such a restaurant, relaxed. The area was spotless despite a couple of heavy storms in a few days the toilets are a pleasure with automatic soap dispencers and taps, light come on when you enter and extinguish when you leave, and my daughter told me with great delight that in the Ladies a toilet seat cover is automatically dispensed as the seat automatically come down!

The food and wine were impecably presented and cooked, I have difficult in remembering specific dishes but the Grilled Vegatables, Chateaubriand and the Zabaglione we fantastic.

Afterwards coffee and a choice of around nine Grappa including Vintage 83 and 87 which were something I have never tasted before.

I will update this after our visit (Mid August)    [08 May 2003 10:09:54]

Food:    Service:    Ambiance:    Overall: 

     ­Graham Stapleton   gstapleton at arbitergroup dot com

If you are experiencing your first visit to Sorrento, and maybe looking for an eatery with personality of the Italian kind, please do not go to this restaurant. The Tasso was recommended to me by a local lace shop owner as THE place to eat, frequented by locals and reasonably priced. Perfect, I thought, whilst visualising large laughing families and steaming bowls of pasta.

When my husband, eight year old son and I arrived at the Tasso I was disappointed. On that evening, the tables were busy, but only with tourists like us, there was little local colour. The menu read like a British TV chef cookbook (I have plenty so I should know) flowering up the descriptions of the dishes.

My son chose a pizza which was delicious, as was my husbands choice of ravioli to start. For my main course I opted for simple grilled seafood, this consisted of two large grilled prawns, a langoustine and a large uncut squid. As my serrated knife had been replaced with an old fashioned fish knife, the scene of me trying to saw through the rubbery squid must have seemed quite comical. At the time I was not amused, both the squid and useless knife nearly sped across the room in disgust. My husband's steak with mushrooms was perfect and house wine and Fanta well matched.

Yes the toilet was quite entertaining, the service exemplary and everything looked squeaky clean but the Tasso was not the sort of restaurant I was hoping for that evening. There is no visible menu at the entrance and you cannot see into the eating area from the street in order to gain a feel of the place.

We had one starter, two main courses with plain salad, two half bottles of house wine, a pizza and soft drink, and including cover this cost 90 euros plus tip. This I do not describe as reasonably priced. We did have some wonderful food during our weeks stay in Sorrento, but the Tasso was not one of the highlights.
   [01 Nov 2004 08:42:50]

Food:    Service:    Ambiance:    Overall: 

     ­deryn