Circolo Popolare

Has to be some of the best Italian I have had. Visited on my birthday and it was absolutely amazing. Loved interacting with our host Rishad. Had a lovely chat with him about London while he recommended stuff and they were on point. Overall, a banger of a place!

Just because a restaurant went viral on social media doesn’t always mean they’re serving good food and treats their patrons with respect (a lesson I have to learn many times in London) First, I would like to highlight the good: ordering customised pizza was easy - our waitress was lovely and helpful. The pizza was so good as well. The decor of the restaurant was also very pretty - going for this alone I guess was a nice experience. The pasta was underwhelming. I ordered carbonara but the pasta was partly hard to chew and kept sticking on my teeth, the sauce was bland and the guanciale often had hard bits. We also had the tagliarini granchio e limone but could not taste the lemon in the sauce - just strong tomato taste. Lastly, the host in the front was so rude. We came to the restaurant and saw a long queue, but because we had a reservation we came straight to the front and explained this but he rolled his eyes and said ‘everybody here had a reservation’ and I was confused, some people in the line got turned down because they didn’t have a reservation. Okay, so we queued and when it was our turn, we were told to wait for our table in the corner. Then he SUMMONED me back to the host table using his fingers and asked AGAIN for my reservation. After confirming again, he told me to go back to my corner to wait for my table. Good lord queuing in custom at the airport was a nicer experience compared to this. Too bad the first contact with the restaurant was bad, the waitresses inside all were friendly and helpful though! It was a busy evening but they kept smiling and serving quickly. If you want to experience the decor, sure go, but don’t expect good food and good service. We spent £100 for 3 dishes and 6 drinks (we had 1 mocktail, 2 wines, 3 coffee) so price wise is not the worst but you can get better food with similar price.

I’m honestly very disappointed with my experience. I chose this place to celebrate my birthday with my friends because I had heard great things and had high expectations. When we first arrived, everything seemed fine and the service was very welcoming. We ordered a pizza to share while waiting for the rest of our group. Unfortunately, it arrived slightly cold, and the flavour was quite underwhelming. Later, my partner and I ordered a carbonara to share, and my friends ordered the same dish. The difference in portion sizes was shocking. My friends’ portion was incredibly small—literally so little that we were able to picked up the entire serving with a single fork. We mentioned this to the staff, and they kindly brought out another individual portion as an apology, mentioning this one will be on the house, which we really appreciated. However, when I checked the bill more carefully, I realised they had actually charged us for that extra pasta. It should never have been added to the bill, as it was offered as a gesture of goodwill after we complained. To make matters worse, the pasta itself was undercooked, with the noodles still quite hard. The restaurant is beautiful, and the atmosphere is lovely, but overall the food and the way this situation was handled left me very disappointed. I had been really looking forward to celebrating my birthday here, but unfortunately, the experience fell far short from my expectations. That said, I do want to end on a positive note—the tiramisu was absolutely delicious and was by far my favourite part of the meal. It was the highlight of the evening.

My family were visiting and fancied pizza, so after seeing the good reviews we decided to give this place a try. The restaurant was lovely — much nicer than it looks in the photos. The décor was excellent and felt very well done. The pizza menu wasn’t as extensive as in some places, but everything sounded appealing. We ordered Some Like It Hot, Stracciatella Versace and Doppio Tartufo to share. Our favourite was definitely the Stracciatella Versace, very juicy, with a wonderfully natural tomato flavour. Some Like It Hot was nicely spicy and enjoyable. The Doppio Tartufo was pleasant, but the truffle flavour was quite subtle and it was a little drier than the others; a bit more cream would have made a difference. They offer tap water, which was appreciated. We didn’t have wine or cocktails this time, but they looked very tempting. Overall, a great choice and good value if you’re looking for dinner in Soho. Highly recommended.