ASK Italian

This evening’s visit was on impulse. My dining companion and I agreed on pasta and we were round the corner from ASK. We were seated and provided with a jug of water within a couple of minutes. We both ordered a mushroom pasta dish and decided to share a bottle of Prosecco. We were not kept waiting for the mains arrive and it was delicious. I wasn’t planning on dessert however my companions cheesecake came with ice cream and after trying a mouthful I ordered a scope of vanilla and a scope of salted caramel. It was just the right amount and finished dinner off nicely. The service was great and I’m keeping this on my list of places to eat.

Before heading back home to Edinburgh on the train, I met up with a friend to have dinner and we ended up at this place since it wasn’t too crowded and closeby the station.
This Italian place is pretty standard and have many different items on the menu. It offers pizza, calzone, salad, and a couple of pasta dishes. I ended up ordering ravioli stuff with a mix of seafood– crab and shrimp. The ravioli was in a tomato sauce and topped with one big prawn with its head on it.
The dish was below average. The tomato sauce isn’t tangy and fresh while the pasta wasn’t aldente. The flavour was pretty much one note and the taste of the crab wasn’t pronounced. You couldn’t tell if you were eating seafood or just mushed meat in the ravioli… Negative points!
They do use fresh crack peppers and Parmesan. I’m a bit critical with the food here cause of the price. For £11.50, this dish should have been a bit more flavourful and fresh rather than a take away from M&S… Just saying. I’ve eaten at this type of restaurant and the price of the dish a lot cheaper and had a bigger serving.
I guess if you’re not too picky with your pasta and willing to pay £10+ for a pasta dish that you can probably get somewhere else cheaper than go here.

This restaurant was very busy but luckily we had booked a table. We were sat near the door, so every time some one came in it was a draft, which wasn’t great. I know in other restaurants they have put glass screens up to stop this and they really could do with the same here. I had bruschetta and for the main course I chose tagliatelle with ham in a creamy sauce. Finally I had ice cream.

Give this place a try, you won;t be disappointed. I like the décor and relaxed dining.
Fab starters, calamari, anti pesto– good portions, Mozzarella ok, toms fab,. Fettuccine Bolognese lovely ragu Great welcome — friendly service, satisfying. Olive oil is lovely. Nice to have a view outside and not feel cramped. Italian cheesecake– nice raspberry, and gelato– quite sweet, No grappa.

The food is great, the place has a very nice feel and quite beautiful interior design, our waitress jenny gave us fantastic service, would come again!

Chain… yes, Italian by numbers… yes, but still an enjoyable visit to the still «newish» establishment located in Piccadilly Gardens. Starting with the Antipasto Classico Board (to share), with a nice choice of cheese (Buffalo Mozzarella), various meats and a Tomato Salad. There was a olive dip too, which I didn’t try. The mozzarella, was a bit «watery», but I’m relaibly informed that’s the way it should be and it was sufficiently firm in texture. A lovely combination of flavours, and with the supporting Rosemary & Sea Salt bread making a nice light starter. I opted for the Lasagne for my mains, which was served with a light salad and was finished with breadcrumbs (to quote, to give it a bit more crunch !). Very tasty, warm and filling and the breadcrumbs did make it a little bit different. Very enjoyable experience @ ASK, and a very spacious restaurant with excellent service. Worth another visit in the future, as dessert was skipped

Meet the newest addition to Piccadilly Gardens, the Italian chain ASK. For oh so long, the nearest branch to Manchester was in Horwich, for those who are not map nerds, that is right near the Bolton Wanderers Stadium and in the last 2 or so months, it has come to Manchester, with serious competition with local restaurants: Nando’s, Wangyama, Zizzi all being less than a minutes walk away from here.
The menu is quite small for pizzas, which is quite disappointing, I would of liked to see 1 or 2 more options but I understand they need to keep a smaller menu to be able to cook freshly.
This is quite a nice modern store, especially towards the end, you can even see the chefs cook your food.
You can get £20 vouchers for £5 in Clubcard points on Clubcard boost which makes it a real cheap place to go with your QUADRUPLED clubcard points however if you do not have any points left or a Tesco clubcard, it is on the pricy side.
I ordered a Raspberry Lemonade Still to drink, I found it to be a little watery and a very small portion for the price and not a nice drink really.
My food: I ordered Baby Charlotte Potatoes, which were very nice and it is great to see a pizza place have a side dish, suitable for coeliacs to go with my pizza. Whenever I go to Zizzi, Pizza Hut, Pizza Express I can not have a side so having a good quality side GF gives ASK an advantage.
I also ordered a Fiorentina Pizza, I was glad to see unlike previous experiences, the spinach was a good amount and not overloaded however it tasted slightly overcooked on the edges, and slightly undercooked on the middle: quite strange and also they wasn’t enough cheese and it did seem a very plain pizza unlike the same pizza I have had in the place from Zizzi, which is basically next store and Pizza Express in the Trafford Centre (they do also have a store next store) I did enjoy my pizza yes, but it certainly could of been much better compared to the standards set by the Baker Street branch in London.
My friend ordered a Bolognaise and they done it with Spaghetti for her and she did enjoy the meal, although she said it wasn’t fantastic she did say it was «quite nice for italian food», she isn’t a big fan of italian cuisine either.
If you return with your receipt within a month, you can get free garlic bread, it is a good offer but it is a shame it is not GF.
Overall, my pizza was okay but it was going between a few over and undercooked extremes and for the price it should of been much better, the servers were quite nice and even give me a copy of the full, restaurant menu, the drinks were especially overpriced and were not a great cold, non-​alcoholic selection, the food was also slightly overpriced but still, I would return and feel 3 stars is necessary but I do feel upon my next visit it will change to either 2 or 4.