Ed eats
Bacino
Vittoriosa Waterfront
Vittoriosa
Tel: 2180 0985
Food: 5/10
Service: 6/10
Ambience: 9/10
Value: 6/10
Overall: 6/10
Bit by bit, we’re dismantling the more embarrassing parts of being Maltese. As time passes, we’re dragging the country, often kicking and always screaming, into the 21st century.
We’re still not out of the third world yet – we need roads and real internet for that – but we’re well on the way towards Westernisation. This isn’t always a good thing but let’s be optimistic for a while.
The regeneration of entire swathes of our heritage, for instance, is a good thing. As Valletta and the Cottonera area slowly improve, they become shining examples of how our unique landscape can turn from shambles into a living monument we can all be proud of.
I was in Vittoriosa over the weekend and spent time taking in the area. Parts are still in dire need of repair but the waterfront is looking grand, especially now that the inner area has been completed.
Some bits are bizarre. A giant, yellow climbing frame above a stepped terrace, for instance, had escaped my sight upon previous visits. This time, parking just past it, made it hard to miss. Closer inspection reveals that it defines the perimeter of the seating area of a restaurant that is within the road leading into Vittoriosa.
The stepped terrace is an attractive, if impractical, dining area. I nearly tripped on the way to my seat and saw others perform all sorts of antics to keep their balance. When form triumphs over function, a broken hip is all it takes to finally rectify the situation.
The yellow, metal structure is bright and bold, and I quickly decided I like it, even if for no particular reason. I’m sure there are a thousand comments somewhere claiming that it is horrendous.
Anything done to compete with the gorgeous bastions of a city that has withstood centuries of punishment is bound to fail. Might as well make a bold statement in the opposite direction if every expert is going to have a go at you anyway.
I was once told off for publicly stating that I dislike rucola and that I therefore consider it pointless. I’ll be damned if I’ll ever consider asking for permission to state an opinion and the designer of yellow frames is surely doing the same.
Like it or not, food is served beneath it, and this is a good enough reason to sidle up to it and appropriate a table. Seated here on a sunny afternoon should be one of those things described in holiday brochures that attempt to sell Malta to potential holidaymakers. You’re seated within an inside-out museum of Mediterranean history, a spilled pint away from the water’s edge, with the economy of a small nation worth of superyachts to feast your eyes on. If the food is good, I’m retiring here, I decided.
The restaurant is called Bacino, a smart nod to the docks it overlooks. I peeked inside to see transparent ghost chairs within a contemporary interior but it was dark in there, the terrace being the evidently preferred option on such a glorious afternoon.
The service is best described as authentic. I have to tread very carefully here, lest I cause offence. The lady who seemed to be singlehandedly running the terrace spoke to everyone around us in her version of English, always interspersed with Maltese. “Mela these are yours ħi!” is the way she delivers dishes.
I made it a point to show I was a native. I was lucky to get treated to complete Maltese sentences, every single one of which contained “ħi”. Just in case you’re not Maltese, this utterance is pronounced ‘he’ and is an informal equivalent of the Australian ‘mate’, added to the end of a sentence as a friendly and overly familiar gesture.
It is a habit I happen to find mildly annoying but this quickly turned into a mental game of hoping she’d miss one. She didn’t.
You’re seated within an inside-out museum of Mediterranean history, a spilled pint away from the water’s edge, with superyachts to feast your eyes on
Mannerisms aside, she was helpful, attentive and did her job very well. The mannerisms and language are as Maltese as it gets and I genuinely believe it adds to the place. I was surrounded by foreigners and I’m sure they appreciate the full friendliness, idiosyncrasies and all, of Maltese service.
The menus, on the other hand, are not acceptable. They fell apart a long time ago and are all shuffled up, so I spent a while reordering the pages until they made chronological sense. They’re tattered and in sore need of a reprint.
I know they’re expensive and they might have already been ordered, but one does not treat patrons of such a priceless location to tattered menus.
The food is a pretty standard mix of pizza, salad, pasta and grills. There has been an attempt to over-describe the food with many items ‘tossed up’ with something or ‘finished’ with another. I’m amused when one might think a Julienne is Julia’s Child and yet still go all steroidal on the description of a simple carbonara. Buttered onions reduced in cream? In a carbonara? I don’t think so.
In the end, I ordered a burger. I was hoping for inspiring food. The pasta all sounded unnecessarily laboured to me. I wasn’t having a salad. Neither of the three risottos tickled my fancy. I figured I couldn’t go wrong with a burger and ordered the plainest one. I’m normally all bacon-double-cheese but the next up from the plainest burger was too complicated, even by my standards.
I was in the company of a woman who has had a troubled past. So tragic, that when she ordered the risotto marinara I didn’t flinch. At least not outwardly. I just admired her ability for self-punishment. On a menu like this, a bowlful of rice with mixed seafood that has been blast frozen, hopefully at source, is the most one can wish for.
She wasn’t done. She liked the sound of fried prawns in a potato batter and ordered them for starters. I felt I should stick to the burger, perhaps eating the chips first as a pseudo-starter. Or an amuse-bouche if I was feeling a little more bourgeois with the pommes frites.
We waited for quite a while and ordered soft drinks in the meantime. I asked if they served pints and was given an enthusiastic yes by our hostess. She returned a while later with two small glasses and four cans. Taking a proper pint at 568ml, I figured I could handle the extra 92ml. I was just surprised at the format.
The prawns were actually quite decent. The tail stuck out of one end of a circular case made of julienned potato and the entire thing had been treated to a very dry fry so it was crisp, tasty and dry.
Our main courses took another good while and I’m happy when this applies to risotto. There is a higher likelihood that it’s been prepared from scratch when it takes a while.
The risotto turned out to be generous and quite acceptable. The rice was slightly overdone, the stock rich and well-salted and the fish close to what I’d predicted.
Considering what the location must cost and that the dish is priced at €8.50, there is little margin to allow buying a fresh catch daily.
My burger was exactly what is was described as. A toasted bun, a patty and some fried onions. The patty is large and of the commercial variety. It was uninspiring enough for me to eat two-thirds of it and lose interest. The chips tasted much nicer than they looked though, so they served as dessert.
I doubt I should have paid €30 in total for the meal but, once again, I make allowances for the location. It must be a wonderful experience for everyone to be seated there.
Yet I think of tourists in particular. If they’ve bothered to take the time to visit this particularly splendid part of the planet, they’re prepared to pay €15 for a meal but ought to eat a little better.
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