Cafe Harmony offers traditional Italian dishes with a twist

I know I’m not alone when I say that sometimes I just crave really comforting, good cooked food.

That was what I found myself in need of at the weekend. And what food is better for the soul than pasta?

I hit the Italian tab on Deliveroo and up popped Cafe Harmony. I’m very familiar with the restaurant which is situated on Aberdeen’s Bon Accord Terrace. I’ve often heard positive mutterings about it from my foodie friends. But I’ve never actually had a chance to sample the cuisine on offer for myself.

Cafe Harmony is known for serving up Italian dishes with a Mediterranean flair. From pasta to risotto, to kebabs or tajine – as I browsed the online menu I concluded there were definitely some hearty dishes to satisfy my hunger pangs.

The vegetarian cannelloni took my fancy for a main course, but I was also drawn to sound of the menu’s smooth hummus, so I ordered that as a starter with some pita bread.

My boyfriend was craving some pasta too. He ordered the traditional lasagna, but also spied the Sicilian-style pizza bread and ordered that as well.

What I’d call the ultimate comfort food, we also placed an order for sticky toffee pudding – I just can’t say no to that dessert!

The Food

Not to kick things off on a bum note, but when the pita bread arrived I was a little underwhelmed. I expected warm, soft, melt-in-your-mouth pita… but what arrived was hard and cold. I heated the two breads up, but still, it wasn’t quite the same.

Nevertheless, the pita was still good for scooping up the starter of thick, creamy hummus. The mashed chickpeas were blended with tahini, oil, lemon juice and garlic. Although very creamy – just as it should be – the lemon juice and garlic gave it a nice, sharp kick on the side. Delicious and one of the best hummus I’ve tried, it saved the pita bread.

Listed as a starter, we ended up eating the Sicilian-style pizza bread throughout our meal. There was a quite a lot of slices to go round – a bit too many for just the two of us, but I wasn’t complaining. The more the merrier.

Sliced into strips, the pizza bread was thick and very more-ish. With golden cheese melted all over, I was instantly a fan and picked away at slice after slice. Although, when you think of pizza you imagine a rich tomato sauce, but these little beauties were just as delicious without – with added flavour from the herbs sprinkled everywhere.

My mouth was watering at the mere sight of my main course on the menu, and when it arrived the aromas of the vegetarian cannelloni hit me hard. I couldn’t wait to get stuck in.

Now, I’ve seen images of dishes served by Cafe Harmony before online and in Society magazine itself. The food always looks like artwork on a plate. However, while operating a takeaway service, it was clear the same stand-out presentation was hard to maintain. I didn’t mark the restaurant down hard for this. After all, it’s just great Cafe Harmony is still up and running, and hasn’t been lost to the perils of Coronavirus.

After scooping my cannelloni out of the packaging, I placed it on my plate and got stuck in.

Okay, so it didn’t look the prettiest on the plate, but looks can be deceiving… and they were. Unlike other cannelloni dishes I’ve tried in the past, this one didn’t have an overpowering tomato flavouring. No, it had a little something extra – a wee kick, you might say. A subtle spicy flavour ran through the tomato and ricotta, which wrapped itself in between soft, rolled sheets of pasta. The smooth ricotta cheese was beautiful and gave the dish a lovely texture.

It was different, but not bad different. Although if it were up to my personal preference, I would have preferred more of that rich tomato goodness. But that’s only because I can barely handle the tiniest of spicy sprinklings. Nevertheless, I ate it up and scooped some of the filling onto the pizza bread too.

My boyfriend’s clumsily plated traditional lasagna went down well across the table. I swear, we tried to plate it nicely, but it was an impossible task when you’re scooping it out of a tinfoil container.

The lasagna was rich to taste with prominent tangy punches of tomato, balanced out by the layers of creamy sauce. Both the creamy and tomato sauces smothered the beef which was stacked between layers of well-cooked pasta. A traditional Italian dish, my boyfriend couldn’t fault it.

Again, the contents between the pasta sheets made for good scooping with the pizza bread and pita.

Both pasta dishes were extremely filling, but somehow we still had room for dessert… although we did share just the one slab of sticky toffee pudding. That was definitely enough to finish off – any more and I would have been bursting at the seams.

Covered in a rich honey toffee sauce, the STP was a real highlight and lived up to my sweet tooth’s hopes. The sauce soaked into the dense slab of sponge cake. Bite after bite, the sweetness of the honey sauce swirled round my mouth and the softness of the sponge made it such an easy eat. If there was more perhaps I could managed a few more spoonfuls after all – it was that good.

The Verdict

While offering traditional dishes, each one seemed to have its own Cafe Harmony twist.

The restaurant has left me wanting to try more, that’s for sure. With a beautiful venue in the centre of Aberdeen, I’d love to go in and fully experience the restaurant the next time I fancy some hearty, tasty cuisine.

Price: £52.99

Orders can be placed via Deliveroo.