Ponti’s Italian Kitchen

Had a great meal here the other day and it’s a fantastic spot for a meal at Oxford Circus. Lovely service and prompt but allowed us to linger with a few beers without feeling pressured. Delicious ravioli for vegetarians and crispy fried corvettes — good quality, hot, tasty, reasonably priced. I would recommend as a venue for a rendezvous in town — don’t expect haute cuisine but what they do, they do it well.

Came here to escape the rush of Oxford Street, after it was recommendation by a friend. Had intended only to have a tea but was given the menu and liked the look of the full English breakfast (with an Italian name!). It was an excellent choice. The food was well cooked, of good quality and the portion size was good. I thought the value of money– £9 for the breakfast– was excellent’ given that the café is in the heart of one of the most expensive cities in the world.
The staff were very friendly and helpful and the whole experience was a refreshing break from the horrors of shopping on Oxford Street.

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.

Only giving this place 2 stars because the staff was attentive and there was alot of dancing and entertainment going on for kids. The food was next to awful. Wack selection.

Very disappointed with this place now. They no longer cater for the lunchtime office workers and have ditched their express lunch due to its popularity (according to the waitress.) We were given a specials and set menu but weren’t told the set menu only started 2 hours later at 3pm. The food was still nice but portion sizes smaller and previous items like a lemon wedge with my chicken now omitted.
Their location is in a very competitive area for office workers so I won’t be returning. This won’t bother the busy restaurant who obviously prefer the leisure crowd who have more time and money to spend.
Highly recommend Strada a short walk away, similar menu and currently 25% off food bill.

** This review is specifically of the Colazione Vegetariana on the breakfast menu, not the place as a whole **
The Colazione Vegetariana consists of «Vegetarian sausage, baked beans, grilled flat cap mushroom, tomato, toast & a choice of fried, poached or scrambled free range eggs». It clocks in at a reasonable £7.20.
I opted to have my eggs poached (note: plural as above) and was disappointed to only get a solitary egg when the breakfast arrived. I questioned the missing egg, but to no avail.
Staff were blissfully unaware of the typo in their otherwise well designed and printed menu!
The Colazione Vegetariana also only comes with one slice of toast.
Given there are both beans and the singular egg to deal with I think two slices would be a much more appropriate amount of bread for this meal.
Additional slices of toast are £1.20 brining the overall price to £8.40 for a less than eggy breakfast. That said the toast is nice and comes pre-​buttered.
In my opinion there are much better places to spend £8.40 on breakfast.
Buyer beware, or as they say in Italy, «acquirente attenzione»!

I had never been to a Ponti’s and knew nothing about it before I learned one very special fact about this particular branch: if you book ahead, you can join their Pizza Scoula and learn to make pizza *which you’ll get to eat!* for only 18 pounds.
Score.
This was my Valentine’s Day treat to my pizza-​obsessed husband. All good and bad things in his life are in some way connected to a slice of pizza, which he eats the English way (much to my disappointment), with a fork and knife. No worries — at Ponti’s, they don’t discriminate.
For 18 pounds, you get a glass of prosecco, the chance to learn how to make your own pizza, and a scoop of ice cream for dessert. Sounds pretty bare-​bones but our experience was really lovely.
For starters, we walked in and we told them we were there for our pizza course. We were given a cozy corner table and were handed two glasses of extremely smooth prosseco — yum. We were told to look through the menu and maybe order a starter but that the chef would retrieve us when he was ready.
Time flew by, no chance for starters but no problem! The boss was ready to pass down his knowledge of pizza making to us mere mortals. We were escorted to the kitchen (and please be mindful, it was just the two of us — we didn’t have to share this with other couples) where I handed over my handbag, we temporarily passed off our glasses of prosecco and we washed our hands before donning white aprons. Bravo!
The dough balls were ready for us and after seeing the chef do everything step-​by-​step we each had a chance to spread our dough, pat it down, make sure it was the right size and shape, spin it around on our fingers (with plenty of photo opps!) before learning to sauce, add our toppings (everything from marinated tomatoes to rosemary to whatever you want, vegetarian or non vegetarian friendly, and as much as you want). Your pizza is then shoved in an oven which is heated at 333 degrees C for a few minutes while you take your seat, bask in the fun of it all while your prosecco (a cool, fresh glass) arrives at your table and voila! In a few minutes, your pizzas arrive. We also ordered a goat cheese salad on the side. We polished off our meals, had a few more glasses of that prosescco and had the included scoop of ice cream (I had pistachio, he had strawberry).
The experience was a positive one and very fun. It’s Valentine’s Day, we were dressed up so it’s not such an in-​depth cooking class that you break a sweat or ruin your clothes. You have fun, you’re given individualized attention, it’s a very fair price and it’s memorable. Way better than a regular dinner, way more fun.
Book ahead and give this a shot! Not sure if it’s child friendly. Very close to the station, too.

For being located one block from Regents and Oxford Street, I found Ponti’s to be quite cozy, warm and welcoming.
I escaped the rain here on a Monday night after a day of shopping. The staff were all quite friendly and attentive. I still remember how much I loved the spinach and feta ravioli. So good. And it was here that I fell in love with Montepulciano (red wine).
I noticed they have inexpensive lunch specials, and even their dinner prices weren’t bad for a centrally-​located restaurant in London.
I also felt quite comfortable dining alone here as I wasn’t the only one. It’s rather peaceful in here around dinner time.

It seems as if I am a bit of a Jonah with my choices for lunch, as soon as I start to go to a particular business it shuts down. This was the case for Ponti’s in Eldon Street, luckily for me there was another one in Liverpool Street.
My complaint about the Eldon Street branch was that there were too many queues especially if you only want a takeaway. In Liverpool Street there is only one line for takeaways plus they do a great deal of pasta with a Pepsi for only £5.

I came really hungry, and tired just off the plane from Hamburg.
Had a bit of a sigh to myself when I saw Ponti’s from the outside. Half empty, bright lights and italo-​cheese blaring out from the company ipod. But i just wanted some pasta and a beer so wasnt expecting to stay long.
However, it was pretty good in there. Really nice friendly team, happy to chat through the fairly narrow menu.
I enjoyed the food and would revisit next i am here with work (qype).not sure which region of italy the cooking is from though!

This owners of this restaurant must be flushed with cash, given its awesome location right inside Liverpool Street station. They might consider using some of that cash to engage a management consultant … the place is an operations management nightmare.
When you enter you see a long queue (at least in the busy lunch hour) in front of the long counter. What do you then? Mostly you would join at the end of the queue. Incorrect answer. Thats not what you are supposed to do. Various parts of this long counter sells various stuff (first the sandwiches, then the omelettes and the pastas and then the coffee), and you should join at the appropriate point (this you learn from experience, they don’t tell you). Once you have placed your order some people choose to wait for the food while others choose to move along towards the cashier, crashing into people of the first kind on the way. Again you soon learn that you are supposed to pay up and take your seat … your food will come to you (in the lunch hour that is seldom necessary … the guys manning the counter are not fast enough to handle the customer flow properly, the cooks are faster … so the food is usually ready by the time you manage to reach the counter).
The food is decent … it would be a good place to have a nice breakfast if i ever get to work early enough for that. The omelettes and the pastas are good though i found the chips to be very dry and old.
On the whole its a nice place to have lunch in the area, if you can afford the time.