Mid-market mediocrity with all the glamour of Frankie & Benny's

Grasso 81 Dean Street, WID 3SW. Meal for two plus drinks about 160. Open Tuesday to Thursday from noon-11pm and Friday to Saturday from noon-midnight; grassosoho.com

- 

GRASSO may have opened with minimal fanfare but there is basically nothing quiet about it. Magicked into the vast, new-built shell of a Dean Street Wagamama, it is an imitation red sauce joint that hits with all the subtlety of a big pizza pie. Almost 200 covers sprawl across two floors of hectically mismatched retro art. "Disco toilets" throb with flashing lights and pummelling floor-fillers.

There is the domed bulk of an oven tended by thick-armed pizzaioli, a long, bustling bar and, generally, the boisterous, high-volume atmosphere of a steroidal modern trattoria. And then, below the groovy Seventies font of the logo, there is the key phrase "Italian-American Restaurant" - a vital indicator that (like the Dover, Alley Cats Pizza, Carlotta and more) here is a venture tapping into a trend that is suddenly hotter than an arrabbiata made for an enemy.

Which is all to say that Grasso launched just before Christmas by the Sicilian-heritage McCaffrey family seemingly has the whole package of personable warmth, palpable hype and zeitgeist-grabbing, nostalgic appeal.