Napoli

The basement level of the newly opened Prosper Centre is home to a number of restaurants, featuring everything from Vietnamese to Japanese and Italian.

All of them are heavily themed and, at first glance, a little soulless too. Nevertheless,colourful eatery Napoli proves they shouldn’t be written off.

Essentially a pizza joint serving classic Italian dishes, Napoli’s starters are sizeable but it’s worth pointing out that given their prices, one between two people should be plenty.

The wonderfully soft buffalo mozzarella with tomato and basil is excellent (though offering half theamount for half of the 90RMB price tag would be helpful), while the cream of wild mushroom soup (36RMB) is rich, perfectly presented and boasts a great texture.

The Italian cold cut selection and Parma ham and melon are certainly not groundbreaking in their originality, but are still very well executed. And while there are pasta options and three main coursedishes available, it’s the pizzas that make up the majority of the menu. Served in small (45-65RMB) and large (58-85RMB) sizes, the quality of the pizzas are a pleasant surprise, with a nice thin base that’s chewy where it matters, and not over-done toppings that are full of flavour.

The dessert list also consists of several traditional classics – Tiramisu, warm bitter chocolate fondant, a selection of sorbets – but they don’t excite the palate quite as much as the earlier courses do.

Staff are amazingly polite and well trained, lifting the whole experience from three to four stars, however having to hear ‘Nessun Dorma’ four times in one meal does risk dragging it down again.

All in all, Napoli provides great Italian standards with excellent service; we’re just not sure who their target audience is.

Located in the heart of the central business district, it’s a bit too pricey to be a casual lunch venue, but not quite classy enough to take business clients to – hopefully, it will attract a regular clientele from the nearby residential complexes, because the excellent staff deserve for it to do well.

Info

Area: Chaoyang

Address: 5 Guanghua Lu, Chaoyang district

朝阳区光华路5号世纪财富中心B1层

Opening: Open 11am- 10pm daily

Phone: 6562 8576

Main Courses: Meal for two around 300RMB

English Menu Available