No Italian chef worth its mettle will fail in making a good pasta sauce. Believe it or not, we found a great Italian restaurant all the way in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. Not only does Peppino pasta sauce passed our taste test, it aced it. Peppino is located in a quiet spot in Shangri-La Tanjung Aru. Some days it's full, some days it's not. But food is always consistently....delicious! Dinner starts with a basket of assorted breads and bruschettas with three different dips to choose from. Try the darker ones, baked with delicious bits of olives designed to tantalize the tastebuds for more.
Then go for the pastas. Choose any one. It's all good. Cooked perfectly al-dente, this gives the pasta that springy bite we were looking for. A lovely bounce. The bolognese sauce is lovely, not too sour, not too sweet with just the right amount of minced beef to make it enjoyable. But what makes this sauce delicious is the right balance of ingredients, with a hint of beef stock, to make the sauce really flavourful. A truly enjoyable dish. A dust of parmesan cheese will give you that extra kick... if you need it.
The creamy alfredo sauce comes with high praises as well. We love to have this haunting delicious white sauce with tagliatelle (the long, thin, flat strips of pasta about 1/4 inch wide, yes! choose that one!) Mix the pasta with the sauce slowly, letting a generous portion of sauce stick on the pasta and follow it straight to the eagerly waiting mouth of yours. The sauce is not
jelak so the pasta can be enjoyed till the last strand.
"Pastas here are all good"
Wallet heavy patrons may want to (instead) start with the pan fried goose liver served with cauliflower cream. This is an interesting mix of cauliflower cream, with a hint of nutmeg and cheese. Do also try their duck pappardelle, tagliatelle with the game cooked in bite-sized chunks within broth. Another favourite is the pepperoni pizza. A simple pizza can be delicious. Peppino's thin crust version comes topped with a slightly sweet sour tomato base, flavourful pepperoni and slices of garlic which, when baked, caramelises giving the pizza an additional flavour. You do know that once the garlic goes 'in', everyone will know that you've had garlic. But never fear, polish it off with their desserts. Any will do but Peppino's tiramisu is one of our favourites.
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