As the trend goes with fine-dining restaurants capitulating in Hong Kong and diners searching for á-la-carte-friendly restaurants, foodies and influencers are quick to zero in on the latest fine-casual spots that match high quality with affordability.
The newest to hit the scene is Trattoria Felino, a Naples restaurant opened on the ambrosial semi-neighbourhood Ship Street in Wan Chai. The restaurant is an optimistic Italian project that inhabits a space seemingly struck by bad luck, haunting a litany of restaurants with unfortunate endings.
Those familiar with the food of Grissini will recognise chef Marcello Scognamiglio, whose grandma’s cooking is illuminated at his gourmet Wan Chai house. Southern Italian restaurants in Hong Kong, such as Perla and Osteria Marzia, promise punchy, acidic, creamy, and meaty flavours from the food capital of Italy, Naples.
Lunch service only just started at Trattoria Felina – however, they are regrettably not serving pizza and yellow chicken for lunch as of February – so I made an excuse to join five friends for dinner at the eatery.
Trattoria Felino is “ideal” for sharing, as dictated on their website. We begin scoping the menu, before being queried as to whether we wanted sparkling or still filtered water. I asked for tap water, but we were sadly levied a mandatory HKD15 charge, along with an explanation that free tap water is not available. This charge is cheap, but it is indicative of a larger trend of restaurants charging diners up to HKD100 for bottled water to beef up their margins.
The menu of Trattoria Felino is curated with a romantic design on a landscape A3 paper, ranking plates into key Italian food groups such as crudi, pizza, soup, pasta, secondi, and dessert.
Whenever I dine at an Italian restaurant in Hong Kong and see a burrata dish, I order it. Trattoria Felino’s aptly named burrata cheese (HKD138) will now star on my top five burrata dishes in Hong Kong. We ordered two burratas, and both appeared to be cut in half, making up one whole cheese chunk on our table.
The dish sees a dainty sharing of puréed eggplant, sun-dried cherry tomatoes, basil reduction, clarified tomato sauce, and olive oil. I felt Italy in my mouth with the cheese; it’s pickled from the garden, rich in cream, and leaves a hanging umami flavour on the palate.
The main show at Trattoria Felino graced our table: four homemade pasta dishes telling stories of earth, sea, and land. The striking scialatielli (HKD148) hit our mouths first. It is a dark green plate that ties in zucchini with the pasta dough and a basil sauce to drive home a mineral-rich bite. The sauce holds onto a familiar chicken undertone, making the dish memorable.
Members of the table rejoiced at the spaghettini (HKD238), a pasta that must be eaten quickly to savour the garlicky olive oil coating before it soaks to the bottom of the plate. The sea urchin was expectedly nutty and concocted a vivid note of waves crashing against Italian beaches.
This dish is a lesson that Trattoria Felino is best sampled with one or two other diners, not a big group of six; the pasta plates suit a duo diving deeper into the dough. Fortunately, two bites of each pasta were enough to get what Trattoria Felino is all about.
I am a fan of beef ragù, and Trattoria Felino’s tagliatelle (HKD188) is a favourite of mine. The plate is coloured with plump chunks of Wagyu beef ragù and a dusting of cheese. Thick pasta ribbons trail deep in the tomato sauce that possesses a brown colouring and beefy hit.
This pasta dish strikes a balance between overwhelming the palate with strong acidic and beefy flavours and a watered-down dough bowl, as is often found at competing Italian spots in town. This dish is a must-order, and I would pay extra to supersize the ragù.
Endings of a good meal are always upsetting, and our adventure at Trattoria Felino was nearly over. Once the pasta dishes were cleared at speed and drinks ordered (they mix a fine Aperol spritz), the cosa finale arrived: beef cheek (HKD238) served with a frothy potato purée, horseradish cream, and spinach adorning the meat muscle.
Marching one forkful per person of the cheek into our mouths was a reminder that great things come in small packages. The beef bursts with flavour, appropriately served with the horseradish cream that plays off the fat of the meat in a recreation of Mary and Joseph’s love. They are a perfect couple, yet break each other down (in this case, for the better, resulting in a wicked sour and beefy coating on the tongue).
Our verdict of Trattoria Felino
Trattoria Felino maintains a small menu, reflecting the versatility and essence of garden-harvested Neapolitan flavours, kept at semi-affordable pricing.
Joining the restaurant for lunch with six mouths brought us satisfaction with hearty earthy and meaty flair, yet the pasta plates and one main dish did not stretch far with half a dozen forks sharing a meal. I will be back with smaller numbers to try the pizza, ragù, and yellow chicken.
Trattoria Felino, 1–7 Ship Street, Wan Chai, WhatsApp 5697 4477, book here
| Order this: scialatielli, burrata, beef cheek, yellow chicken, La Mortazza pizza Menu: Trattoria Felino menu Price for two: HKD600–700 | Atmosphere: intimate and uniquely Wan Chai, very fine-casual and exclusive feeling Perfect for: a date night to impress your lover, when a bona fide Italian meal is cheaper than a Cathay flight |
This review is intended to offer an individual perspective on the dining experience and should not be considered as a definitive judgement of the restaurant’s overall quality or reputation. The views expressed in this review are solely the author’s and do not reflect the opinions of Foodie.
