336-337 Strand, Aldwych, London WC2 (020 7395 3445). Meal for two, including drinks and service: £120
The newly opened Cucina Asellina, in a hotel on London's Aldwych, likes to live dangerously. An outpost of a Manhattan business, it describes itself as a New York Italian in London. Oh my. New York is a superb restaurant city, but only in spite of itself. Restaurant-going there requires commitment and nerves of steel. You have to be prepared to negotiate with front-desk clipboard Nazis who have all the grim implacability of Iranian revolutionary guards looking for promotion, combined with the fake smiles of Miss World contestants waiting to file a killer sexual harassment suit. The bar is always nine deep, tables are so tightly packed you can identify your neighbour's brand of deodorant, music thumps and the waiters love-bomb you in pursuit of their 20%, as if the restaurant were some goggle-eyed cult which you must join.
There are, mercifully, only a few elements at this London joint which are a reminder of the Manhattan experience. Music over the front desk does have a colon-vibrating thump, and the pretty Italian waiters do everything in their power to become your best friends forever. Every dish you order is declared "Niiice!!!" with a long slow nod of the head and a flash of great teeth. The interior is all white-washed Spanish finca by way of 1970s glitter-ball disco. Which is to say, it's bang on trend. But London has more space than Manhattan so you don't have to sit in your neighbour's lap.
It also brings something especially good from New York: a shameless approach to Italian food, a luscious aesthetic in which more actually is that little bit more. Other places in London do deep-fried olives, but I can't think of anywhere that also stuffs them with ground veal, mortadella and as much fresh parmesan as it's possible to cram into such a tiny space. It is the pimped olive ne plus ultra. It is number 11 on a scale that goes to 10.
The menu nods in all the right directions. There are antipasti which go from "Habitat rustic" – roasted tomato soup – to old-school red sauce Italian with veal meatballs. There are cheese and meat selections and flatbreads. A rugged plank of pizza base comes with sautéed wild mushrooms, spring onions and enough elastic fontina cheese to make the chief medical officer all huffy.
Pastas, all flavoured, are especially good. They have bite and a comforting, starchy, slipperiness, which makes the sauce cling to them, like baby koalas to their mothers. There are ribbons of fettuccine speckled with fresh herbs and piled with lobster and long-cooked cherry tomatoes; tubular garganelli made with ground chestnuts come with wintery lumps of coarse sausage meat and more wild mushrooms.
This being a nod to New York there is beef shortrib, for in New York there always is. It is long braised. There is a pillow of polenta and a puddle of a dark-red wine sauce. It's a down and dirty roast dinner masquerading as some mink-coated, Louboutin-heeled sophisticate.
A tagliata – a seared and sliced steak – with roasted ceps and caramelised baby onions is one of the best pieces of meat I've had in London. The thin layer of fat across the top is salted and bronze-seared and running. The meat is crimson-knicker pink. You can pay an awful lot for good beef in the capital; £19 for this steak feels like a very good deal indeed.
After all that largesse, desserts are curiously light: a passion fruit cheesecake is barely there; a tiramisu has all the requisite flavours but almost floats out of the cup.
Cucina Asellina is moderately priced for what you get. Let's not get too excited. It ain't a slice of New York in London. Nor is it an authentic trip to Emilia-Romagna, it is too urbane for that. But it does deliver on its own modest promise. In a city of constant disappointments, that's something.
Email Jay at jay.rayner@observer.co.uk or visit guardian.co.uk/profile/jayrayner for all his reviews in one place. Follow Jay on Twitter @jayrayner1
