TD 1
outdoor seating vegetarian kid-friendly full bar
wi-fi booking recommended red luas line green luas line James Cirillo – Owner What has Cirillo’s been up to this year? From a business point-of-view, we’ve been very busy this year with a good loyal following. From an ingredient and buying point-of-view, we’ve been trying to buy direct from Italy to ensure we have the highest quality products and to keep costs slightly down, too. In terms of recipes, we are always trying to be as progressive as we can to stay relevant in the industry. Can you tell us about your homemade pasta dishes? Cirillo’s is very famous for its wood-fired pizza and dough, but we also have a full menu with fresh pasta made in-house as well. Our best-seller is the Casarecce Norcina with truffle cream sauce, Tuscan sausage and mushrooms. Also, right now we have a Pappardelle Al Ragú Di Manzo with beef shin Ragú, butternut squash, and aged parmesan fondue which is just superb as well. We spotted Datterini Tomatoes in some of your dishes. Can you tell us a little about them? In Italian “datterino” means “little date”, due to its size, shape, and sweetness. Datterinis are a particularly sweet and rich variety that grows predominantly in the south of Italy, just outside of Naples. They are of superb quality with a phenomenal flavour when put into any of our sauces or even raw. A lot of our dishes are not complete without them. What latest trends are evident in the pizza industry and customer demands? The Neapolitan pizza trend seems to have died out a bit and a lot of American-style pizza places are popping up in the market. Personally, we prefer the Neapolitan style. There’s just something about the whole wood-fired oven that makes the pizza taste much better. There’s no comparison. What is the greatest challenge in the industry right now? Without a doubt, it’s been the constant rising costs and VAT increase that have taken a massive hit on us. Unlike other places, we didn’t raise our prices at all. And with the VAT increase all of a sudden, the pizzas would cost €20. For me, that is too much. We’d rather take the hit on the margins. That’s the thing about Cirillo’s since the day we opened, we never intended to be an expensive restaurant. We are all about quality food that is a good value.