Lunching at my favourite Italian restaurant!

Our good friend Emmanuelle was visiting her cousin in Nice for a few days, all the way from London... So naturally this called for a get-together. And what better place for the get-together than lunch at one of our favourite restaurants on the Cote d'Azur, Il Giardino, located just on the other side of the border in the Italian village of Vallebona.

Having picked up Emmanuelle and her cousin in Nice, we sped down the A8 into Italy, happy to enjoy the sun (welcome back - it's been sadly absent over the last couple of weeks!). We arrived at the restaurant just on time, and dug into the food straight away. I love the concept of Il Giardino: for the rather reasonable price of 30 Euros, one is treated to 9 antipasti, 3-4 plates of pasta, 3 plates of meat, a desert, not to mention as much wine as one can handle (and coffee and limoncello to finish off!). Hard to find better value for money than that - especially considering the food is delicious as well (in a "cooked by grandma" kind of way).

So, needless to say, we very much enjoyed the food. The fact that the meal takes rather a long time, meant there was plenty of time to catch up with Emmanuelle. After the meal, we had a nice walk in the village, enjoying the sun... (Vallebona is built on the slope of a valley, so walking up and down the cobble-town streets is quite a good way to get rid of all those recently-acquired calories).

The way back was a bit of a pain, with some crazy traffic jams between Vallebona and Ventimiglia. But all in all, a fantastic way to spend a Saturday (you just can't go wrong with this place), and great to see Manue again!