Fiamo Italian Kitchen - it's Dine Around again!

We're coming to the last few days of Dine-Around and have landed at Fiamo Italian Kitchen.

A nostalgic stop, as this was one of my first blogging entries…but I digress.

Even though I'm making this recount fast and short (and there's only a few more days to take advantage of Tourism Victoria's Dine-Around promotion) it's not like Fiamo's is going anywhere - so use this dinner review the way Dine-Around is intended - get your interest peeked (or your memory jogged) about eating out at one of the great restaurants that this city has.

Now onto the food.

The atmosphere at Fiamo on lower Yates St. is warm and lively with exposed brick walls, comfortable booths and a great bar to watch the kitchen & bar action from. And there's prosecco (Italian bubbly) on tap - always nice to sip something good while reading the menu.

Fiamo has both $30 and $40 dine-around menus. Although both of us at the table opted for the $30 one - there were some great sounding items on the $40 one (pork cheeks!).

And to tide us over until our courses started arriving - a coiled basket of warm bread served with balsamic and olive oil. Twist my rubber arm....

Fiamo has two choices for appetizers on the $30 menu - a BLAT salad (bacon, lettuce, advocado and tomato) and mushroom soup. The salad was really nice - a whole ripe tomato split in half with a thick (read: THICK) slice of bacon lying across, seated on a dollop of mashed advocado. The greens are a mix of peppery arugula and crisp watercress - all drizzled with a thick balsamic.  The soup was equally as good - a silky-smooth mushroom soup - very creamy, rich and earthy tasting. Good thing about that bread - perfect for mopping up.

BLAT salad (bacon, lettuce, tomato & advocado)

Mushroom soup

We both chose the same main course - pork belly & seared scallops. Great dish - the scallops were nicely prepared (still moist in the middle) and went nicely with the pork belly (a saltier, smoky hit of flavour). They were sitting on a bed of Israelis couscous and saddled up to broccoli rabe (a much brighter green in person than my photo below). The pan juice was fabulous (it's always the simple things, isn't it?) 'thank-you' again, bread.

Pork belly & seared scallops

And for dessert we opted for one of each of the offerings - flour-less chocolate cake and tiramisu. The cake was definitely a good hit of chocolate - like a really rich, dense brownie. The tiramisu could have fed a small army....and everyone would have been happy. It was a great dessert - multiple layers of cake, cream & light custard flavoured with coffee and finished with a dusting of cocoa powder.

Flour-less chocolate cake

Tiramisu

We had a really nice dine-around meal at Fiamo, all due to the great food and really genuine, friendly service. It was also helpful to peruse their regular menu too - with delicious sounding pizzas (chianti-poached pear & gorgonzola) and pastas (butternut-squash ravioli) and salads (smoked tuna). Add to that the smells/sites/sounds (steak/flame/sizzle)...well, you'll be planning a return visit in no time.

And did I mention the prosecco on tap?

Fiamo Italian Kitchen
Dine-around is on until Sunday

Regular hours:
Daily from 4pm, Sun-Thu until midnight, Fri/Sat until 1am
250-388-5824
Website: fiamo.ca
Twitter: @FiamoVictoria