Reviews Ponti's Italian Kitchen - John Princes Street

Super fast quick service I have ever seen in Italian kitchen .......overall good food and good ambience .good experience......🍻🍻🍻🍕🍕🍕🍷🍷

Just off Oxford Circus is Ponti’s, a traditional family-run Italian restaurant with a history inspired by hard work and big dreams. Walking in, I was drawn to the open kitchen reminding me of eateries I’ve visited in Italy. The pungent smell of garlic and cured meat created a little rumble in my stomach and by the time I sat to meet my other companions, I was ready to dive into good food.

Great Italian Restaurant! Great Pasta and Meat dishes. Service was fast, staff always concerned, well instructed and very friendly!
Very well decorated, friendly pub-like ambient.
I strongly recommend!

On a flying visit to London and a lot of walking we were looking for somewhere to eat on a busy Friday night and after much searching Ponti's came to the rescue. Hidden just off Oxford Circus, Ponti's offers both inside and outside dining.

We were warmly greeted and shown to a nice booth by the window. Perusing the menu, the traditional Italian spread is on offer. We decided to go with garlic bread with cheese to start. I went for risotto asparagi, my sister went for spaghetti carbonara and her boyfriend went for pizza with a side of fries. We all got soft drinks, although one of the mocktails was unavailable which was a bit of a shame.

The garlic bread arrived swiftly on a wooden board and we devoured it quickly. This was just as we had hoped flavour wise. It was small so could easily be sufficient for a starter for 1. Onto the mains. My risotto was lovely, with great asparagus flavour. My only comment would be to add more pieces of asparagus in it to give it more texture. The carbonara was tasty and I got pizza envy over the pizza.

We did have to wait a little bit for the bill but you can't have everything.

A hidden gem!

I recently came to Ponti’s Italian Kitchen, for their ‘pizza scuola’ which runs on Sunday-Thursday evenings.

On arrival, we all lined up at a long table in front of the wood- oven kitchen and were introduced to one of the Ponti’s pizza chefs who would be our mentor for the evening. He spoke to us about how they make the pizza’s at Ponti’s and showed us the correct way to prepare and shape the dough, before giving us a demonstration by throwing dough in the air and spinning it around his fists! Each of us had our own pre-made dough base in front of us and were encouraged to practice stretching and shaping it into our desired pizza shape – the dough is really fragile, mine virtually split as soon as I stretched it so I decided to leave the pizza tossing to the professionals!

 Once we were happy with our bases, we got to work creating our own bespoke pizzas by loading them up with tomato sauce, cheese and a selection of ingredients which had been laid out before us. I went for a particularly piggy pizza consisting of chicken, red onion, chargrilled veg, goats cheese, olives, pepperoni  and chillis – literally everything in sight!! Your pizzas are then cooked in the kitchens and served to you back in the restaurant. We had such a good evening and was great fun being able to get hands-on with your dinner, I’d highly recommend going with friends or even as an alternative date idea, I know this is something my boyfriend Tom would love!

The evening sessions cost £23.90 per person, in which your pizza, a glass of Prosecco and ice-cream is included.

On Thursday I visited  Ponti's Italian Kitchen for a tasting evening to sample its 50th anniversary menu.  The small chain of family-run restaurants from the Emilia Romagna region in Italy is celebrating its fifty years with a selection of simple, classic and inspired Italian dishes;  all  of which were good.   I can't believe I hadn't discovered this little gem; a spacious and relaxed haven smack, bang in the middle of town, only twenty metres from the hustle and bustle of Oxford Circus. We started with bright green, nutty, fresh olives before moving onto roasted butternut squash, Buffalo mozzarella, wilted greens and crispy parmesan. The salami, Parma ham, vine-ripened cherry tomatoes and 18 month matured Parmigiano Reggiano with Sardinian flat bread was perfect.  I missed the next dish of scallops (my only allergy) wrapped in Parma ham in garlic butter with warm focaccia, which did look good, so made up for it by gorging on smoked Scamorza cheese wrapped in Parma ham with sage but

There is no fresher hell than Oxford Street during the festive season. Step off public transport and say hello to the modern day version of Dante’s Inferno, all nine circles of it.

The Ponti’s Group is a UK Italian chain with a handful of subsidiaries. You have Caffe Italia found in airport terminals; Ponti’s restaurants in Watford, Wimbledon, Liverpool Street Station and Bluewater Shopping Centre (where I spent too many hours of my youth selling trainers in Footlocker then upgrading to skirts in Zara); and two Ponti’s Italian Kitchen’s on Duke street and John Princes Street (Oxford Circus), both in W1.

The concept of the latter is to showcase quality ingredients from the Emilia Romagna region of Italy, where the roots of the family that has run the restaurant since 1963 lie. The Oxford Circus location is an altogether different kettle of pesce to the rest; befitting of its location, well thought out and believably authentic.

Strings of garlic and dried chillies suspended from the ceiling furnish the pizza bar at one end of the restaurant alongside a small deli, with cured meats and Italian biscotti mingling with the warm glow from the Christmas decorations in the windows. A Wednesday evening at 7pm and almost every table was occupied (and not all by tourists).

Sweet roasted butternut squash was served with wilted greens, very fresh and milky buffalo mozzarella and salty, crunchy nuggets of Parmesan breadcrumbs. Briny black olive tapenade and ice cold fleshy green olives from Puglia accompanied beautifully brittle flat Sardinian bread. Scallops wrapped in crisp parma ham were soft and seasoned and well acquainted with the garlic butter they were cooked in, served still in the pan alongside warm focaccia.

The cured meats were those of quality: salame piacentino (made from pigs reared in Emilia Romagna and Lombardy and then processed exclusively in the province of Piacenza), capocollo (Italian cold cut made from dry-cured whole pork shoulder or neck), Parma ham, cherry tomatoes, Parmigiano Reggiano, green olives and more bread.

Pollo alla piastra is a Christmas menu option and saw garlic and thyme roast chicken sitting alongside, honey glazed parsnips, cranberry sauce and roast thyme potatoes. An unobtrusive plate with meat that was well cooked, but who goes to an Italian restaurant for Christmas-spiked roast chicken? Not me. Stick to the pasta.

Which was really very pleasant. Large delicate ravioli parcels generously stuffed with spinach and ricotta, drizzled with sage butter, topped with a crispy leaf, fantastically seasoned and very satisfying.

Side-stepping Christmas pudding which is wasted on me (I find it too rich, boozy and intense), the bomboloni were exquisite little packages of hot and sticky delight; doughnuts filled with sweet ricotta, glazed in acacia honey and with a wisp of citrus from lemon zest, served with vanilla pod ice cream and a second stomach in which to find room.


Four hours and almost two bottles of very good Pinot Nero from Emilia Romagna later, my companion and I rolled ourselves out, the final table to leave. You won’t find ground-breaking innovation, mind-blowing flavour combinations, or reductions painted onto your plate with a brush here. What you can expect are quality ingredients executed simply, in a warm eating-at-nonna’s-house atmosphere, in a very central location, for very reasonable prices.

Have a seat and stay a while, or at least until the shops have closed.

Liked lots: atmosphere, service, central location, ravioli, wine, the deli to buy imported Italian goodies
Liked less: the Christmas menu (I never like Christmas menus)
Good for: forgetting just how much Christmas shopping there is left to do, and the limited time in which to do it; whiling away a few hours; taking refuge from the madness beyond the door.

My rating: 3.5/5

I had dinner here with my friend on Sunday. When we entered we were informed that they don’t have pizza anymore which was a disappointment but we decided to have pasta instead. We ordered spaghetti and pasta. In drink they had wines, cocktails as well as mocktails. The food tasted good but the quantity of the pasta should have been a bit more. The mocktail was also nice but given that it’s a nonalcoholic drink I think it shouldn’t have been that expensive. The environment inside the restaurant was good, they even changed our table on our request. Overall it was a good experience but it is on the expensive side. We didn’t have to book, they had many tables when we walked in around 7pm

Decent Italian food. Portions are average - wasn’t completely full though. Enjoyed the seafood linguine the best! Plenty of nice outdoor seating / also with a heater option for when it’s cold and windy!!

I came to Ponti’s yesterday for a birthday meal with my partner. We booked it a couple of days beforehand without having been here before and it didn’t disappoint. Cos (sorry if I spelt your name incorrectly!) was our waiter and he was absolutely brilliant. Really attentive and lovely to chat to. The food was even better than I had when I lived in Italy and the cocktails were fantastic. We’ll definitely be returning and I can’t wait already! Thank you for the best birthday dinner! Here’s what we ordered: (Bruschetta) Focaccia with nduja and burrata Sliced Mortadella Carbonara Tortellini with a butter and sage sauce Tiramisu Bomboloni fritti Espresso Martini, Hugo Spritz, Margherita (this Hugo Spritz was the best I’ve ever had)

Always my go-to place for a little break when I go for a bit of shopping around Oxford or Regent street. It's tucked away from the crowd, quite cosy for a rather big place and both drinks and food are good. Staff is very accommodating

Some of the best Italian food I’ve had thus far worth every penny!