IMMO, Worcester

Now it's a modern little pizzeria called Immo... all soft lighting, neutral walls and soft muzac. And apparently it boasts the only traditional pizza oven in the city. The home of the mile-long salad bar and thick-crust American-style pizza is long gone and Immo seems to be a very welcome replacement.

My friend and I decided to try this new addition to Worcester's dining scene on a Wednesday evening and although we were not the first couple in there it was very quiet. However, by the time we were tucking into our main courses, more diners had arrived and the place was all of a buzz. Not bad for an evening in the week by any restaurant's standards.

The menu is extensive, offering a wide variety of hand-tossed pizza, calzones, pastas, risottos and salads, all of which sounded very tempting and were reasonably priced. It took us a fair bit of deliberation before we could pinpoint what we fancied eating. Fortunately, the waitress was sympathetic to our tricky dilemma and gave us sufficient time to decide.

To start, we shared pane con cipolla (£4.25), a delicious, freshly-cooked garlic pizza bread topped with caramelised balsamic onions and melted mozzarella cheese. The menu advised that there was enough to share, and that was no joke. It was a good-sized pizza base, divided into eight portions. Enough for four people to share, happily.

Not wanting to spoil our main courses, we chomped our way through four slices of the flatbread, but declined the rest, although it was so tasty I would have happily wrapped it up in a serviette and taken it home for a midnight snack had the waitress not been so efficient in whipping it away.

Our main courses arrived in good time. Keen to try the freshly stone-baked pizzas, I opted for a traditional margherita (£5.95) and was not disappointed. The base was wafer-like and crisp, and the toppings tasty, although I would have liked the tomato sauce to have been a bit chunkier and more rustic.

My companion opted for an insalata verdure (£7.25), a vegetarian salad of roasted peppers, aubergines, onions and courgettes, tossed with semi-dried tomatoes, olives and mixed leaves. Bound in a delicious Italian house dressing and served with four baked dough sticks, this dish was, we both agreed, the star of the show.

The vegetables were tender, flavoursome but still had bite, while the vinaigrette added sufficient piquancy without drowning the leaves - moist without being saturated or too oily.

Almost satisfied, we decided to share a dessert and chose the vanilla and hazelnut bombe.

A genenrous scoop of vanilla ice-cream enrobed a chunk of sweet meringue and was coated in a crunchy mix of crushed hazelnuts and chocolate. It was an ideal way to end the meal.

Service was efficent and polite and the meal was what we both wanted. Judging by the midweek diners filling Immo it is clear that the restaurant is most definitely getting it right.

Immo Foregate Street, Worcester.

01905 617797

Service **** Food **** Value **** Ambience ****