Vieni, an Italian restaurant in Birmingham's Jewellery Quarter, is small, Sicilian and scrappy. The Instagram bio of chef and founder Angelina Adamo reads, 'Bite off more than you can chew and learn how to fucking chew,' which feels like a battle cry for independent hospitality ventures. Adamo previously ran the kitchen at The Circle Lounge inside Birmingham Hippodrome, serving arancini to theatregoers. Now she operates this tiny nook on the edge of the Goodsyard development, offering dishes like Sicilian fennel sausage with cacio e pepe butter beans, fregola with clams, and an ever-changing dolce of the day.
A menu of hearty, not trendy, dishes
Vieni's menu includes 32-hour ox cheek crispy lasagne as a starter, Pyefleet oysters with British strawberry and champagne vinegar, seabass crudo with peaches, basil and green chilli, and ruffled mafaldine with vodka tomato sauce. The arancini are notably large—'not your piddly quail's egg-sized arancini so popular in Britain'—served in a puddle of tomato sauce and heaped with pecorino. The restaurant also offers a barbecued whole sea bream with peperoncino 'nduja butter, burrata with melon and Brummie honey, and whole globe artichoke with hazelnut pangrattato.
A happy hubbub that can't be faked
According to the review, Vieni has 'a happy hubbub' that cannot be piped in or orchestrated. The atmosphere comes from genuinely pleased diners enjoying dishes like s'mores toasted marshmallow gelato or the large barbecued sea bream. The restaurant dances a fine line where British-Italian restaurants often fail—it's not the Spaghetti House or a red-sauce mom-and-pop spot, but sits closer in spirit to Moro on Exmouth Market, London, yet 'it isn't remotely intimidating and you are actually being fed.'
Practical details and pricing
Vieni is located at 41 Pitsford Street, Goodsyard, B18 6LJ, near the Jewellery Quarter station. Opening hours: lunch Wednesday to Saturday noon-2pm, dinner Tuesday to Saturday 5pm-9pm, plus brunch Saturday 9.30am-11.45am and Sunday 10am-2pm. The cost is about £50 per head for three courses, plus drinks and service. The reviewer notes that the menu changes frequently, with the dolce of the day varying from s'mores gelato to maraschino cherry gelato with lattice shortcrust.
