Positano Restaurant

Breaking from the Italian stereotype, this is a restaurant that does not dress itself well. From the outside it looks plain, crowded and ugly. The tables positioned by the windows make the dining experience seem far from private. Apart from the menu, there is hardly anything to draw you in.
Inside, the story is not that much different. Italian odds and ends hang from the walls. Pictures of beautiful scenery are everywhere you look.
Sam B. got it spot on when he he said this is ‘nothing to write home ago’. If this was what my holiday in Italy was like, I wouldn’t be wasting my Euros on a postcard, or my saliva on licking the stamp. Rusticity is high. Flair is low.
But somehow this place is quite popular. Especially, it seems, among the older generations. This is perhaps someone else’s idea of a good restaurant. The décor is inoffensive. The food is what you expect. The wine is in abundance. As I can get all of this in my own kitchen, I won’t be returning.
URBAN CHALLENGE: Get there before 5 for their early bird dinner offers

Positano’s is a bit of a weird one. We went there when it was dead inside, with about four front of house staff and we weren’t bowled over by the service. There’s a varied menu of pretty much everything you’d expect from any of the Italian restaurants in Cardiff but not the individual, special experience you’d think they’d be driving for when there are so many chain restaurants doing the same kind of thing in the City.
The prices were decent enough and, although I think my memory might be failing me, we went for the set menu for £5. You can add starters and desserts for around the £2 mark aswell. The food was really good in fairness but again, nothing too memorable or anything to write home about and certainly on a par with other local restaurants such as Bella Italia.
All in all, I wasn’t bowled over but certainly don’t have too many negative memories either. The service was very friendly but not entirely attentive and even though we were alone in the restaurant, had to call someone over for more drinks on a couple of occasions.

I came here once for a friend’s birthday celebration, and I was somehow (perhaps unreasonably) hoping that Positano was my lifebuoy in the sea of Italian restaurant chains like Bella Italia and Zizzi’s.
The experience was not quite like I anticipated, unfortunately. I felt like I was eating dinner in a fishbowl — not because we sat near windows — but because for some reason we shared the company of four servers who stood in far corners of the dining area watching us.
It was a little creepy, to be honest. I guess we should have been grateful to have that many men at our whim, but instead I kept looking over my shoulder to see if that dark-​haired dude was still there, watching us. And every time I looked I saw that, yes, he was.
I wish I could say the food more than made up for it, but it was mediocre at best. If you’re in the area and have a hankering for Italian food, try Casanova by the Millennium Stadium instead.