Osteria Del Tempo Perso

Great service, lovely setting and a gratis welcome prosecco. Very warming on a December lunchtime.
The polpette starter seemed so densely packed that they could in physics parlance reasonably be called singularities, but given my usual moaning about loose meatballs having to chew a little is no bad thing. Nice cheesy, tomatoey sauce. The lasagne main was a little liquidy, giving me a slightly burnt and petted lip, but with plenty of cheese, tomato and meat in this course too we left very happy people!

This is a really pleasant place, providing excellent food, decent prices and superior service.
I popped in for Boxing Day dinner and was immediately seated in a nice spot and offered a free glass of Prosecco. Not my usual tipple at all but appreciated. I ordered pizza and a side of rocket/​parmesan. Both very nice and exceptionally well priced. The rocket especially was tasty and crisp, while the pizza was perfectly cooked but too big for me in one sitting.
I was enjoying the relaxed atmosphere so much, and chatting to a neighbouring table, I even ordered desert! I had the chocolate tart with vanilla ice-​cream. The latter was excellent, as was the tart. Definitely home made.
So, as mentioned, service was superior throughout. My initial welcome was friendly and it felt like nothing would be too much trouble. My allocated waitron remained unobtrusive yet attentive throughout. Cost was only around £17, so a decent tip was well deserved.

Recommended to my son by a friend as the best Italian restaurant in town… really friendly staff, good service & great food indeed. Shame we were just there for a quick lunch. To return and enjoy another time… a must

A excellent wee Italian place tucked away in the Merchant City. The food was lovely and the décor is beautiful inside. The arancini was particularly great! All of the waiters who spoke to us were Italian and very friendly. I will definitely be going back!

This place is great! They have an outside area outside the Italian centre which is a great little sun trap and this is what took us along this way when the sunshine was out last month and we wanted to eat outside. It used to be a Tony Macaronis which was always nice enough but I was totally thrilled when it had changed to this super place :-)
They advertised a £6.95 lunch deal and we bagged ourselves an outside table and settled in for the afternoon. The deal was for various antipasti/​bruschetta boards plus a glass of Prosecco starting at this price and you could add on a main course from a set list for another £5. We opted to share an antipasti board and a mixed bruschetta and for mains lasagne for me and mortadella pizza for the boyfriend. The antipasti board was just amazing — lots of delicious Italian meats and cheese and breadsticks. The mixed bruschetta also yum with three different flavours .We could actually have stopped eating after this as the antipasti portion was rather huge but powered on to our mains which were both really good. The pizza probably the best — with garlicky pesto and fat slices of mortadella on top of a yummy fresh made dough. I could have happily sat in the sun drinking wine all afternoon and they made no attempt to hurry us away which was nice.
would definitely recommend this to anyone looking for great food in Glasgow — especially if the sun is out.

Well well, what do we have here? Another smart little Italian restaurant on the Glasgow scene that doesn’t exclusively serve up your typical Spag Bol and Carbonara. This makes me very happy indeed and long may this current trend continue!
Osteria Del Tempo Perso is about the quirkiest name of just about any restaurant in the city, literally meaning «The Tavern of Spare Time». The name alone grabbed me, its rather poetic and its gotta be better than a place called «Mamma Mia“or the like.
I didn’t know much about this place, but I had heard rumblings that the sister restaurant in Edinburgh did some fine cooking. It turns out the restaurant dates back to 1861, however the name was purchased more recently by a family in central Italy (Frosinone) in 2003 that aimed to recreate some of the old traditional recipes from long ago.
Well fast forward a decade or so and these guys have now started to invade Scotland too, opening up their latest restaurant in the Merchant City of Glasgow. Being a massive lover of Italian food I was keen to give it a go and I purposefully starved myself that day in order that I could squeeze at least 4 courses into my belly.
To begin we opted to share a focaccia for the table. We went for rather imaginative sounding mortadella with pistachio cream. It was superb. For me you just cannot beat the taste of mortadella on freshly baked bread. It was great to tuck into this as we looked over the menu and wine list. And when I say wine list, I may as well say wine directory!!! Literally pages of fine and quality wines. If you are a lover of the old vino, this place is for you.
We opted for a bottle of red from the Campania region and it was poured into what can be described as a giant wine glass decanter. Any place that serves wine from a decanter must know a thing or two about wine and service, and it was at that point I started to feel a bit posh, hehe ;)
To begin I went for a classic parmigiana. It had a really nice firm consistency, not overly sloppy with a really good amount of aubergine. The tomato sauce was nice and simple, not overly flavored which was good. I wasn’t over fond of the rather cheap looking mozzarella cheese strands on top, but perhaps I was just trying to pick faults in the dish. It was also a very generous portion which was satisfying my rather empty belly.
Next up I decided to go for one of their specialty pasta dishes. The Mezze Maniche (half rigatoni) with Italian saliccia (sausage) and saffron. The pasta is cooked to order, with no pre-​cooking, therefore it generally takes a bit longer to prepare. I am more than happy to wait for my pasta as I like it ‘al dente’. It was again a very simple dish and very delicately flavored. The light saffron sauce complemented the fennel flavored sausage wonderfully.
If all that wasn’t enough I ended the night in style with a Millefoglie with chocolate and chantilly cream. When it arrived, it looked pretty darn impressive, but when I started diggin in, I realised they had basically «de-​constructed» it, and so it lost its bite and it didn’t quite work for me. I’m not sure if I was just overly full by that point, but it just didn’t float my boat. My dining chums on the other hand thought it rocked.
It should be mentioned that «Osteria» is ultra laid back. The waiting staff chilled, the cooking done from scratch, such as the pasta, so do not expect to nab a quick bite to eat and then head out. Instead, relax, take your time and enjoy a nice bottle of wine. Even all the hundreds of clocks that adorn the walls and shelves stand still, so just take your time and go with the flow.
I think considering the restaurant has just opened its doors, I had an excellent meal and I’m sure its only going to improve as they embed themselves in. Its really refreshing to see proper Italian restaurants opening in Glasgow and trying to do something different so this get a massive tick from me!