June 21, 2011 3.43 pm This story is over 153 months old

Brayford Italian restaurants battle it out

Food fight: The Brayford now plays host to three different Italian chain restaurants. Which will you be going to?

Three Italian restaurants on the Brayford Waterfront are vying for your custom, with the latest addition of Zizzi, which opened on June 20.

The restaurants, Prezzo, Ask and Zizzi all have similar menus and appeal to the same clientèle. Ask and Zizzi are both owned by the Gondola Group, but they are still acting competitors in the local market.

The Lincoln Prezzo has been open for two years and is recognised for its affiliation with celebrity chef Aldo Zilli. The chef has a number of special recipes which are exclusive to the 160-strong restaurant chain.

Anastasia Manohhina, Supervisor at Prezzo, said: “People like our restaurant because of its romantic feel and design. All of the three restaurant’s menus only differ in price by a couple of pounds, so I think style and ambience counts for a lot.

“Zizzi will obviously be busy for a while as they are new, we will have to see in one or two weeks whether their presence will hinder our business.

“Italian food is very popular and it is probably why there are this many outlets for it. We have a number of loyal regulars, some of which have even tried Zizzi and then come back to us.”

Zizzi has just over 100 restaurants across the country and have been operating for 12 years. Their nearest branch outside of Lincoln is located in Newark. Similar to Prezzo, Zizzi also has an open kitchen design with a stone bake oven.

Sanket Turang, Assistant Manager at Zizzi, said: “Here, we pride ourselves on our fresh food and customer service. Our opening was really successful, but we will have to see over time how we compete with the other restaurants.

“Even though we are a chain, the design of this Zizzi restaurant is Lincoln themed. We have a number of symbolic references to the city, from the steps inside to symbolise the uphill and downhill of Lincoln, to our red line lights to symbolise the Lincoln Red Arrows.

“Service is a vital part of the Zizzi experience and our staff are trained not to just serve people food, but make them feel comfortable and enjoy themselves.

“Another incentive for people to choose our restaurant, is our ‘Pick-a-Prize’ promotion. Every Monday for our first month of business customers will have to chance to win up to 100% off of their meals”

— Later update: Laura Kestle, General Manager of Ask Restaurants on the Brayford, said: “At Ask we are very welcoming, our service style is really relaxed and very friendly, and we pride ourselves on making sure our customers have a great time!

“I think our food is fantastic, we have been working along side top chef Theo Randall in creating authentic Italian food with the best quality ingredients available.

“We’re perfect for romantic meals, lunch breaks, parties, soaking up the sun (when it shines), for family get together’s, our kids menu is brilliant too….they love the mini calzones and doing pictures for our colouring wall.”

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