'Look after your guests and they will look after you'

THE Carpenters Arms Italian Kitchen is the kind of restaurant where staff really look after their customers.

- By LYNETTE PINCHESS

They know if regulars have got a favourite table and their likes and dislikes.

If they're obsessed with a particular dish which is not on the menu at the time they visit, they might have it waiting for them as a surprise. The way they look after their guests has earned the family-run establishment in Walesby a stack of nominations putting them into the final for best restaurant in our Notts Bites competition, celebrating the best food and drink in the county.

"It’s that connection. We do that for them and then if anything like this crops up they dive on it for us. Look after your guests and they will look after you,’ said chef and co-owner John Boddice, who runs the kitchen with Italian chef Christian Colarietti, while wife Louise makes sure front of house operates smoothly.

The restaurant serves authentic Italian dishes and everything is made in-house. They grow the vast majority of vegetables and herbs themselves. The summer menu features the ever-popular focaccia bread, leek pasta, crab-and-prawn-filled pasta, saltimbocca with chicken breast and parma ham, porchetta, and desserts of tiramisu and panna cotta.

John said: “Me and Chris are in there every day which is how we maintain the standard. The bread and beef ragu have been our biggest sellers from day one.”