Glasgow’s restaurant scene has no shortage of Italian restaurants but La Fiorentina does something a little different. A landmark institution on the city’s Southside, it recently celebrated its 20th anniversary but the ideas coming from the kitchen are as bright and fresh as when La Fiorentina was a cheeky bambino. Multiple menus run at various times on different days of the week and they are matched by nearly as great a choice of rooms to dine in. Whether you want to eat in the bustle of the main dining room or enjoy a little privacy in the Little Tuscany Trattoria, La Fiorentina has a range of options.
Glasgow’s La Fiorentina uses top notch Scottish ingredients such as beef, lamb and seafood to create inventive Italian food. Some of the dishes, like the tomato, bread and chill soup or the Fiorentina salad, nod towards Tuscany while others, like the polpettine Mama Napoli or baby meatballs, look further south on Italy’s culinary map. But whether you want a quick pepperoni pizza or a multi-course banquet with a plate of lobster tortellini as the centrepiece then La Fiorentina has the sort of pedigree that has kept at least a couple of generations of Glaswegians coming back. Not for nothing was La Fiorentina the first restaurant to scoop the Auchentoshan/Spirit of Glasgow People’s Choice Award, as voted by the readers of the Evening Times, two years in a row.