When you imagine Italy, what typically comes to mind? Perhaps it’s the winding roads that trace the striking water-laced hills of the Amalfi Coast, the grape vines and crumbling villas of the Tuscan countryside, Pompeii’s ruins, or the countless innovations of the Roman Empire.
For a relatively small country, Italy has a lot to offer. So, it’s unsurprising some of the country’s equally remarkable regions are left forgotten in lieu of the most Instagrammable sights. The same can be said for Italy’s regional cuisines. Favouring Napoletana pizzas or Roman tonnarelli cacio e pepe is an effective and unquestionably delicious way to celebrate the country’s food, but it certainly isn’t the whole picture.
In Australia, restaurants that celebrate Italian cuisine often exclude the scope of Italy’s north. The regions of Piemonte, Valle d’Aosta, Lombardy, Trentino-Alto Adige, Friuli Venezia Giulia, Veneta, Liguria, and even as far south as Emilia-Romagna each bring a different perspective to the country’s cuisine. It is a broad area, with flavours spanning the cooler climate of the Alpine region and the abundant produce of the Po Valley to seafood from the coast — not to forget the culinary influences from neighbouring France, Switzerland, Austria, and Slovenia.
For the team at Neptune’s Grotto, devising a menu isn’t about pedantically replicating a cuisine. Rather, it’s about using culinary techniques and traditional flavours as inspiration, as evidenced by the influence of Northern Italian cuisine on the menu. “I wouldn’t like to be pigeonholed,” says Co-Owner and Chef Dan Pepperell. “But we’ve taken a lot of inspiration from that region.”
While the sunlight and outdoor dining area at sibling restaurant Pellegrino 2000 lends itself to Roman-style dishes like amatriciana, carbonara, and lots of tomatoes, Neptune’s Grotto has provided the team with a chance to showcase a different style of Italian food, which was largely inspired by the space itself. “Neptune’s felt more late night, moodier, darker, and cavernous,” says Pepperell. “It’s underground, so you can eat heartier and richer foods. We thought it was a cool concept to create a grotto in a cave under the building. There are private booths all down the restaurant and you can sit there for longer and get a beautiful handmade pasta. It’s a bit more intimate.”
Before Neptune’s opened its doors late last year, Pepperell went on a last-minute trip to Milan, Venice, and Bologna. “It was a good little inspirational tour,” he says. But for the fitout, the real inspiration came in late 2023, when Pepperell and his fellow co-owners Mikey Clift and Andy Tyson went on a research tour to New York. “We went around to a lot of those old-school Italian places in New York. “We got some funny ideas for the fitout and picked up bits and pieces from antique stores.”
The northern Italian influence can be seen in the handmade egg pastas which are less about extruded semolina and water doughs and more about egg yolks and flour. “They’re much richer and more luxurious pastas because it’s a lot cooler up there a lot of the time,” says Pepperell. As the chef points out, the climate of the region heavily influences northern Italian cuisine. The cool, mountainous areas are ideal for growing high quality corn and mushrooms and enjoying hearty carbs like polenta. The fertile Po Valley, which runs from the western Alps to the Adriatic Sea, is a centre for rice cultivation, covering risotto and Venetian risi e bisi. The region’s cattle yield distinctive milk, enabling the production of rich butter, cream, and cheese traversing gorgonzola to parmigiano Reggiano. The cool climate lends itself to rich food, and influences from neighbouring countries strengthen this from cream sauces influenced by French cuisine and potatoes, stews, and meat styles referencing those found in Austria and Eastern Europe.
Speaking on the style of cooking, Pepperell says the tagliatelle Bolognese has been exceptionally popular at Neptune’s Grotto. “It’s like a slow-cooked pork and veal ragu,” he says. “We add confit veal tongue as well. We cook the veal tongue separately and then we dice it up so it’s soft and fatty. We mix it through the ragu at the end with lots of butter and parmigiano Reggiano.” The ragu is served on top of egg yolk pasta, which Pepperell says is “bright yellow with a really nice al denté bite to it”. The dish is typical of Bologna, but the unique addition of the confit tongue lends a fresh take.
Tajarin pasta (also known as tagliolini or taglioni) is a traditional dish of Piedmont. Neptune’s pairs thin egg yolk noodles with a modest tomato and basil sauce. Then there’s beef battuta, an Italian take on French tartare made with diced topside steak. “We mix it with parmesan garum [made using rinds] we source from a local chef and top it off with parmesan and hazelnuts from Piedmont,” says Pepperell. “The dish is very northern. I guess that part of Italy has more money, so they can afford to eat beef and use butter, expensive hazelnuts, and parmesan Reggiano.”
Tortelloni is also on the menu. The large stuffed pasta is similar in shape to the classic tortellini in brodo from Bologna, but bigger. “We make the dough with spinach through the egg so it’s bright green and fill it with ricotta, truffle, and artichoke,” says Pepperell. “Then it gets brown butter and parmesan on top. Another northern classic on the menu “that you don’t see around much” is cotoletta alla Bolognese. “It’s basically a crumbed veal cutlet cooked in a pan with lots of butter,” says Pepperell. “We lay prosciutto over it and parmesan and then we top it off with a cream sauce.”
The Emilia-Romagna dessert zuppa inglese is another star of the show at Neptune’s Grotto. Stemming from the Italian verb inzuppare, which means to dunk — referring to the sponge inside that is typically dipped in liqueur — the name literally translates to English soup, leading some to believe zuppa inglese takes inspiration from English trifle. Pepperell’s version sees sponge soaked in beetroot and raspberry juice before it’s placed atop chocolate and blackberries and surrounded by thick vanilla custard.
The team has proven the worth of mixing in elements from different areas, allowing variations to punctuate the oft-rich northern Italian style of many of the menu items. A popular dish that rebels from the classic is the tomato pie. “For the fitout and vibe, we took a lot of inspiration from New York,” says Pepperell, although he’s quick to clarify that visitors shouldn’t expect New York Italian spaghetti and meatballs. Rather, Neptune’s Grotto’s ‘pie’ is a deep square pizza based off a grandma slice you’d find in a New York pizzeria.
Another dish that branches away from the northern offering while remaining complementary is the tuna caponata. “We flatten out tuna sashimi and fill it with concentrated caponata,” says Pepperell. “We then blanch, peel, and semi-dry tomatoes overnight in a low oven before we turn them into a jam that’s mixed in with the caponata ingredients of pickled celery, pine nuts, and smoked eggplant. It’s almost like a concentrated relish which we wrap the tuna around. It’s been really popular.” Sydney is, after all, a seafood-loving city, and the fish-centric take on a typical Sicilian dish speaks to the team’s understanding of which menu items will resonate with guests.
The benefit of adopting a menu that both delves into and expands on a niche regional cuisine is manifold for Pepperell, Clift, and Tyson. By merging aesthetics with a well-researched menu, the restaurant has made a big impact on the local dining scene since its launch. Meanwhile, Sydneysiders have been given a ripe opportunity to explore a different side of the much-loved cuisine.
This story was originally published in Hospitality Magazine March – April 2025. Subscribe to newsletter or print.
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