We have had a pretty long day, starting at around 3 this morning for me. The journey to Manchester airport took us a shocking 3 hours due to a car on fire closing parts of the motorway we were on, which eventually just led to a complete and utter standstill. When we finally got to the airport we actually had to run all the way from the carpark like madwomen to the bag drop desk, dragging 4 rather heavy cases behind us, and we just managed to make our first flight by the skin of our teeth.
After a 35 minute flight down to London, we had a couple hours wait in Heathrow before carrying on to Paris (where I was randomly upgraded to business class for free - cheers BA!)
We arrived into Paris around 3pm local time and took a taxi straight from the airport to our hotel in La Defense, where I managed to cram in an hours power nap before getting ready to go out for dinner at a place across the square, called Va Piano.
Va Piano is a fun little Italian chain, where your food is prepared fresh in front of you by the chefs. When you enter the restaurant you are given a small card, like a credit card, which is then used to keep a tally of everything you order.
There are three separate stations: Salads & Antipasti, Pizza and Pasta, each one with a different menu to choose from. You decide what you want at each station, place your order with the chef and then scan your card on a little machine and your order is added to your tab. At the end of your meal you simply take your card to the till by the door and settle the bill there. It saves time paying at the table and gives you way more freedom in ordering your food.
Me and my mum started off at the Salad and Antipasti bar - me with some bruschetta and her with a small caesars salad.
We ate and chatted, and the beauty in being able to take your little card up to the station and order what you want there is that you don't feel rushed into ordering anything by a waiter who is juggling another 10 tables of hungry/indecisive customers. Not being able to decide what I want and ordering the wrong thing are regular occurrences in my dining-out-life, and so the ordering system at Va Piano suited me perfectly! You decide what you want to eat, when you want to eat, and can see it being prepared from scratch in front of you. You can also talk to the chef about making adjustments to your dish, and on the table there is olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper and various herbs to add to your meal. You also take your card up to the separate bar whenever you like for drinks and it is all settled at the end when you go to leave.
For our mains, me and my mum shared a ham & mushroom pizza and a bowl of tagliatelle with pesto and pine nuts. Both were delicious, though I think the pizza was the winner hands down as it somehow managed to be sloppy but still quite fresh and light - perfection!
To be honest I'm in love with the concept and all the food we had was delicious. The atmosphere was very relaxed and you felt like you could really take your time with your meal, there was no rush to leave once you had finished eating, or move onto the next course immediately. I'm told they have restaurants in London and Manchester, and will definitely be keeping an eye out for them next year!
