Campannina

Campannina is considered by many people as well as myself as one of the best Italian restaurants on Kata Beach (Phuket). It is a simple restaurant with no windows; outdoor dining. It has an open kitchen and you can see all the action. I consider Kata Beach as the second nicest beach on Phuket Island and this area is lucky to have such a great restaurant. We have not been to Campannina for some time but always remembered that they had one of the best foccacia in this world.

So, ofcourse the first thing my friends and I did was to order the foccacia which was stuffed with cheese, rocket and parma ham. The foccacia was cooked perfectly. The dough was perfectly crunchy outside, the cheese hot & gooey and the rocket and parma added the texture and flavours that make this an outstanding starter of our dinner.

The next dish was a pizza with spicy salami. It was mandatory that we tasted one pizza. I really hate pizzas with soft, limp and soggy dough in the middle. But at Campannina, the dough is perfectly cooked and crunchy all around. The cheese was of good quality and the salami had the right spicyness. Delicious.

The first wine that we drank with our food was a 2001 le Clos du Caillou. Normally, this wine is fantastic. However, the 2001 was pretty much on its last legs. The red colour was weak, it was short and no fruit.

The next dish was Puttanesca with penne and big squares of mozzerella cheese. The penne was cooked al-dente but the puttanesca was not as flavourful as I hoped. The anchovies and capers were few and difficult to find.

The next dish was tortellini with bolognese. The bolognese was very good, right thickness, lots of meat and rich flavour. The tortellini skin was too thick. You had to chew quite a bit to get to the filling.

The secod wine we had with our dinner was L'Esprit de Font Caude 2004. A fantastic wine with blend of Mourvedre and Syrah. Concentrated wtih delicate tannins. A perfect compliment to the rich italian food.

Overall, the dinner at Campannina was great. A few minor issues I had with the food but that did not overall defeat the wonderful atmosphere and food. A definate repeat.