Jamie’s Italian

As far as chains go it’s an easy option for lunch. We were lightly welcomed at the door by what seemed to be lots of staff floating around looking for direction. After being seated in the large conservatory we were waited on in good time. As a group we tried a variety of dishes including one of the infamous planks which was nice (lacking on the chilli jam for me). We had a nice relaxed meal where we were left to our own devices. Getting the bill was a little tricky; there were many people waiting but all seemed away with the fairies.

This is a big place, so it had space even though it was raining (and the Bill’s down the road had a 35 minute wait). Food was fairly basic fare. They didn’t ask how I wanted my steak cooked, so it came grey. The rainbow slaw (mostly just carrot and white cabbage, so not very ‘rainbow’!) tasted like it had been made with a sweet dessert yoghurt, and the contrast of its fridge-​cold temperature with the hot chips was unpleasant. The garlic bread was like shop-​bought stuff, with the butter still only partially melted. Wish we’d tried one of the pubs down the road.

Not good at all. I honestly didn’t have that high of expectations, since I’ve learned to know better than to assume an egotistical food celebrity putting his name on a place will magically make said place automatically amazing. Yet, still, Jamie’s Italian managed to disappoint even my low expectations. (To be frank, the only reason I booked a table here for lunch was because other restaurants in the area were all booked up… in hindsight, definitely for a reason.)
The biggest thing was that my group and I were starving human beings who showed up exactly on time for our reservation to a table not ready for us, and then were made to wait an hour for our main courses to come out – mediocre mains, especially considering the price of this place. Non-​high-​end food at a relatively high-​end price is not anybody’s cup of tea, I would think.
A redeeming quality was my side of garlic bread. For about £3 you get your own small loaf of gooey, soft, garlicky goodness. The servers were nice enough, but sometimes seemed to get confused about what they were doing while they were in the midst of doing it (sorting through who ordered what, for instance).
All in all, don’t waste your time here.

Having went on the assumption that Jamie’s would have had fantastic food and great service, I decided on taking the Mrs and our friends here for her birthday — mistake.
Rude staff.
The food i had ordered was the big burger main with fries. The fries were cold, the burger was burnt. The burger buns were also burnt.
Would rate my experience as a 0 if I could — would not recommend at all, AVOID.

The only thing that was good here was the wine, probably because it was not prepared there.

Hoping to have a nice lunch in Greenwich we stepped into Jamie’s Italian.. Expected a Jamie Oliver restaurant to be good. Sorely disappointed. First of all, had a 10 minute wait for a table even though the restaurant appeared not very busy with many vacant tables. Then waited another 10 minutes before a server approached. We finally placed orders. My husband ordered penne pomodoro and I ordered penne carbonara with pancetta. Both dishes arrived in a reasonable time however both were underwhelming. The pomodoro had one tiny piece of tomato on it and the sauce tasted like a thickened Campbell’s tomato soup. You know that feeling when you take that first bite of a dish and the flavor just bursts in your mouth? Well, my first bite of the carbonara was so bland, it almost had no flavor at all. It looked like plain old macaroni & cheese and appeared to have been pre-​made & re-​heated. It could have used a sprinkle of grated parmesan but we never saw our server until we were at least halfway through the meal. A good dose of salt & pepper made it at least edible. We were finished quite awhile before our server retrieved our plates & offered dessert which we declined. We were afraid to try anything else. Then we waited another 10 minutes for the bill but our server was very quick to pick up our money! Totally not worth the price either! Wow! Never again!

Really disappointing. Wasn’t expecting too much, just planned on a quick, relatively pleasant lunch before we got the train.
My partner and I ordered bruschetta each, and a salad and polenta fries to share. They were both fine, if unspectacular. What really let it down was the fact my bruschetta was soggy and not even toasted!
By the time I had someone’s attention and had a replacement my partner had nearly finished all her food, and to be honest even the replacement one was quite under seasoned and bland. The portion sizes are also minuscule for the price.
One redeeming quality was that our server was lovely, and helpful when I had to send my food back.
Overall, I would avoid.

The staff is friendly and fast. However the dish was only average. One of my lamb chops was cooked too much. The only thing I liked about the lamb chops was the fresh herbs coming with the plate.
You should have only pasta or wine plate. They serve the white wine cold which I liked.
So this place is for wining not dining :)

Visiting in England, of course we must hit the famous Jamie Oliver’s restaurant. Since he has occupied our Sobey’s here in Canada, will visit him here in London. We tried JAMIE’S SAUSAGE PAPPARDELLE — Ragù of slow-​cooked fennel & free-​range pork sausages with Torrione Chianti. You can taste the fresh pasta, very chewy texture. The ragu pork sausage was good, but wish there was more sausages in the sauce, felt like I was eating a vegetarian dish. The other pasta dish we had was the linguine with smoked salmon. Scottish smoked salmon is more fatty, juicy and tastier compared to Norwegian smoked salmon. It’s so good, going back to the regular salmon I have been eating is just not the same any more.
We went all out for desserts as well. AMALFI LEMON MERINGUE CHEESECAKE and SOUR CHERRY & ALMOND TART. Both very good, not too sweet but tasty. Overall, not a bad meal and at reasonable price.

I am surprised to see all the negative reviews, they must have done some improvements! We were seated quickly for lunch on a holiday weekend. The space is open, many windows, similar to a green house. The décor was very modern as was the food. I had a caprese salad and we shared the Italian ravioli as a starter. Italian ravioli had a smoky flavor which was interesting. We also had a great waitress, she was polite, attentive and very cheerful. Overall great food, great vibe!

Terrible service — we have been three times and always so slow and rude.
Mediocre food — nothing special. Overpriced.

I went here on a Saturday night with my dad, aunt, uncle and cousin, and found the place very spacious, despite the limited space. From the street, it looks like a tiny place, but extends out a fair distance, as far as a small heated section of outdoor seating.
It was fairly busy, as can be expected for a Saturday evening, but the atmosphere, set out like a rustic Italian-​style bistro with an open kitchen area, bar and waiting area near the entrance (well stocked with magazines and things to entertain children, which makes the place ideal for families) and also brewery equipment, used to make the on-​site speciality beer, were on display, which was interesting.
Considering how busy it was, we were not kept waiting too long, perhaps up to 30 minutes between courses. For the starter, we ordered a meat platter for four, (including a selection of Italian ‘cold cuts’, smoky cheese topped with chilli jam — which was amazing! — capers, olives, pickled green chillies and shredded vegetables mixed with flavoured oil — another highlight of the course) which easily did five of us.
For the main course I ordered the prawn linguine and a side of polenta chips (for curiosity’s sake) which were well presented, and delicious. I also tried my aunt’s ‘funky chips’ and the ‘posh chips’ which came with my cousin’s meal; same sort of thing, but with a completely different flavour and texture each.
The Epic Brownie, which I had for dessert was a bog-​standard warmed-​up brownie dressed up with flavoured popcorn and Amaretto flavoured ice cream, which made it. My aunt had a sample platter of all the available desserts, which was the special at the time. All of this washed down with a shot of Limoncello, the liqueur of the day, a favourite of mine and my aunt’s.
We did have to wait a while for our coffees, but again, I would put this down to the sheer bustle of the restaurant by this time. There was a good selection, including Irish coffee, which my uncle went for.
The staff were very helpful, our main server (who was such a cutie!) went out of her way to get us what we wanted, and see if things were available. My cousin is quite a whiskey connoisseur, and she went to double-​check what was available to try. The other servers were also very polite, gracious and helpful.
In conclusion, it was a very good dining experience, the surroundings (not so much the food, although it was all delicious) offering an authentic Italian dining experience, and the seats can get rather uncomfortable, especially if you are there as long as we were (just under three hours) so book ahead and get a booth! Also, it is fairly expensive, working out at around £44 each for us, but it is perfect for special occasions; there were at least three groups having birthdays on the day we went. Booking, whilst not mandatory, is recommended, with plenty of notice.

A bit expensive. Good, but pricey for what you get.

So, given that the previous reviewers ratings are dreadfully LOW– maybe they have stepped it up a notch, okay half a notch because I didn’t have a terrible meal here. I don’t expect much from a chain, and this is not different. To add to this, I wasn’t impressed with his offerings at the last Jamie’s italian I visited, the canary wharf branch– in which the italian nacho was just so so so disappointing.
I enjoyed this meal far more than the one at canary wharf, so this is a good thing! Given that we turned up on a Sunday night as a large party with a baby, they were so accomodating, and I have to say this– service at Jamie’s has always been great– impeccable and friendly at both branches– also they’re all pretty fit. There, I said it. LOL. I ordered the truffle pasta as a small portion to go with cheesy chestnut mushrooms! Truffle pasta was good, the pasta was good well– al dente with a good bite, but a little overseasoned. But an Italian place that does pasta well– Jamie’s italian is what it says on the tin. The cheesy mushroom– I wish I had more, more crispy bits and also more mushrooms! Maybe I picked well, but those who picked seafood within my party, didn’t seem blown away.
The letdown in this menu was the dessert, the profiteroles, were ice cream profiteroles and this meant that the pastry wasn’t light anymore, it was the texture and taste of cardboard and the ice cream inside was too hard– and the hot sauce that came with it, wasn’t warm enough, and the bowl was too small to contain all of the sauce plus 3 profiteroles + cream. Like it wanted to be too much– showing off it’s technical ice cream and choux pastry skills, but also wanting a traditional finish, thus serving it with cream. Just weird. The brownie fared better– the combination was just right, unlike the profiteroles.
I give this 2.5 stars tops– but staff kick it up a little, so I’ll settle with 3 stars. But honestly, if you can avoid it, I would– there are better places for italian food.

Argh, it pains me to do this.
I like Jamie Oliver. Lots. I follow him on Instagram (cute pics of food and country farming and fresh plates!), I love his initiative to do a health makeover on the UK, and I appreciate his ability to get me into watching cooking shows back in the day (I had a mild crush on him as a teen, which helped).
This chain of Jamie’s, hmm… I think it means well, but it just doesn’t deliver. It’s torn between being a chain restaurant and trying to do fine dining. The result, for me, was chain-​quality food with fine dining portions. And prices that didn’t justify (give me street food any day).
I had a spaghetti special of the day which was cooked with some white wine and seafood. My dining +1 had the porkchop with much-​lauded «crispy skin» atop. The deal with the mains here is like at a steakhouse: the meat basically comes, just that, with a sauce. So we tacked on some chili-​enhanced broccoli and some polenta and rosemary fries. Glasses of wine. Thought we’d be set.
The spaghetti was… fine. It had a grainy texture and was not as thin as a spaghetti should have been. The seafood sauce was lovely: hints of wine and garlic and well-​seasoned.
The broccoli, too, was well-​seasoned, but the veg itself was cooked to mush.
Polenta fries were not just outta the fryer so had a crunch on the outside but a mushy just-​above-​room temperature stodginess on the inside.
What was most upsetting is that in all of these instances, I think the recipes /​concepts were good: the execution was just really poor.
The pork chop was perhaps the biggest disappointment. I WAS LOOKING FORWARD TO NABBING SOME CRISPY SKIN. Instead, the chop was dry and the skin was «decorative» in that it was shaped into a big loop but far too hard to even attempt to crunch through. So we didn’t. Decorative win, edible fail. Doesn’t some well-​known chef say that you should never use decorations for a plate that aren’t also edible? I’m with THAT guy.
We didn’t stay for dessert because we were too bummed out by the offerings so far.
Unilocal note: I feel like I’m bagging hard, here. I think feeling like you overpaid *and* got a bummer of a meal turns you into a Unilocal grump. Maybe just an off day? I do like the décor, though, and my heart remains with Jamie despite a meh meal.

I like Jamie Oliver and I like his food, simple, stripped-​down, no-​nonsense, tasty food. I liked his restaurants, kind of funky but liad back. Cool staff, you know, like «you’re cool, I wanna hang out with you» kind of cool? But I don’t like that there are so many of them now.
I had been to Jamie’s Italian in Canary Wharf before and liked it. It’s a refreshing change from the usual stuffy, posturing places in Canary Wharf.
I went to the new one in Greenwich with some friends at the weekend. They don’t take advance bookings, so we had to walk in and hope for the best. There were already some people waiting to be seated when we turned up. That was a little bit odd given the fact that it could clearly be seen that there were plenty of empty tables. By the time we were seen to quite a bit of a queue had built up.
Our waitress was competent, you know, she took our orders, brought us food, etc… But she wasn’t quite an enigmatic as the staff I had encountered their other restaurants. Canary Wharf beats ya! Sorry!
One friend ordered some bread for us to start with — meh, it was a bit of an anti-​climax. I had the Baked Shetland Salmon as main and some Funky Chips. I’m glad I got the chip and the meal was disappointly small, arranging in an aesthetically appealing way, but small. I resigned myself to the fact that I may be about to have an unadventurous taste sensation — see what I did there, see that, see that? That’s a paradox!
OKAY, I’m getting carried away here lets get back to the food! The fries were over-​cooked and greasy, blah! Actually, that is a peev. If you’re going to have salmon on the menu shouldn’t your potato options be more than just chips? Just saying.
I had the Epic Brownie for dessert. LOVED the amaretto ice-​cream and popcorn, but the brownie itself was just a standard brownie, no big deal. My other friend had the Tirimasu which I tried and found it heavy and stoggy.
So, I’m sorry Jamie’s Italian, Greenwich, I’m not feeling it!