Poco Loco - Novena

Rather exclusive and hard-to-notice place for Italian food, but when we walked in, most of the tables were reserved. Seating space was kinda small so it turned out to be a lucky break for my group to be able to get seats. That was actually a good sign. We first tried the mushroom soup, which turned out to be actually made of mushrooms, a surprise after seeing restaurants skimp on the soup and providing canned soup so many damned times. The soup was actually good, served with truffle oil on top for an additional depth of flavour. Next was the clams with white wine sauce. The white wine sauce tasted pleasantly of the required white wine without being overpowering, and the clams were nicely cooked. Overall, quite good. But the best is yet to be, as they say. The sea urchin pasta was seemingly middling in terms of portion but actually amazing in terms of flavour. A few pieces of sea urchin on top conceal a yellow sauce which tasted extremely strongly of sea urchin. This sauce had soaked into the spaghetti, leaving the spaghetti with a strong flavour of sea urchin as well. The squid ink pasta was also really good, peppered with pieces of squid that were kinda hard to pick out. The pasta was also cooked al dente, as was the sea urchin pasta. The risotto was honestly the star player of the meal, served with a thick cheese based sauce that essentially soaked into the risotto, giving it a pleasant richness and flavour that really was unrivalled by anything else we had ordered. The cold melon soup was also amazing, being made of blended rock melon and served with Parma ham on top. The melon soup was refreshing and palate cleansing, and the Parma ham tasted like what a Parma ham should taste like. We ended up getting a panna cotta for dessert, which was also really good. Sour cherry sauce was placed on top of a surprisingly light panna cotta, making for a light and airy dessert and also a great end to an excellent meal. All in all, I would gladly recommend this place to anyone who is even slightly fond of Italian cuisine, as this place is extremely, extremely good at it. 🍝

Worth the price and lovely restaurant setup. Scrumptious and delicious food! Prices were on the slightly higher end but still reasonable.

I tired the Manzo ($13.50) with beef and truffle cream sauce, it is amazing! The pasta was al dente and it doesn’t feel surfeit. I wouldn’t recommend the Granchio ($13.50) as it tasted slightly like canned fish? Also, students get 10% discount all day, so definitely recommend this place!