Over the past few years my friends have been sprouting up little’uns faster than I can count. And as a consequence of this, I’m asked if I can recommend any places that are kid friendly but also adult friendly. Many places are of course mutually exclusive. the fancier it looks, the less welcoming they are to enfants and normally stylish mums can find themselves sacrificing good cuisine and avoiding scowls from fellow diners and waiters. There was one place that was said to be kid friendly yet with good food too: Giovanni Pilu’s new restaurant in Terrey Hills called Cavallino. And Liss from Frills in the Hills was just the gal to go there with along with her three little girls, Eloise (7), and 5 year old twins Laura and Olivia. They would be the test of kid friendly chic.
On the former site of Il Piemonte, it’s all very swish outside, with stone work and wooden detailing and a horse emblem of course as Cavallino means Little Horse (a synergy with owner Pilu’s own Ferrari perhaps?). The greeting is very friendly and to the left there is the bar and lounge with more horse themed decorations.
Cheese fridge
To the right is the large 180 seater dining room which sits in front of the large pizza oven where four pizza makers are constantly throwing dough, sprinkling toppings and placing pizzas inside and taking them out of the large oven. There is a pizza with French fries on it but we think better of it and order more “regular” fare. There’s an all Italian wine list and whilst there are mains which include meat, the big menu is the pizza menu with seventeen varieties of pizza.
The Produce Trolley
“Who wants to have a look at them making pizza?” Liss asks and the girls jump and down. The girls are definite foodies and they happily eat all sorts of foods.
The antipasto counter
At the front there’s also the antipasti section where a huge wheel of reggiano sits with crumbled reggiano inside it. A staff member puts together an antipasto plate and Liss points out the cheese fridge. When she last visited she was busy looking at the cheese fridge filled with imported Italian cheese and Pilu came out and they talked for a while. There’s no sign of him here today though.
The girls watch them making the pizza
Fresh tagliolini pasta with blue swimmer crab, pantelleria capers, cherry tomatoes, garlic and chilli $25
All the pasta is said to be made fresh daily. The fine taglioni reminds me of soft egg noodles and the amount of fine flakes of crab is generous and well dispersed throughout the dish. It’s not huge, about the size I could eat although Mr NQN (who is absent anyway) would want more. The capers from Pantelleria, south of Sicily are not as vinegary as regular capers and I await a sharpness that doesn’t come and perhaps that is because the capers are packed in salt rather than brine.
Panzanella Salad $8
The Panzanella salad or Tuscan bread salad with truss tomatoes, cucumber, Spanish onion, basil and olive oil. The salad is pretty and the pieces of torn bread are soaked in dressing. I’ve tried panzanella salad with more crunchy bread where the bread has been more half soaked which to be honest I prefer but that’s just me.
Ghiotta $23
Tomato, mozarella, ham, mixed mushrooms, porcini, black truffle paste and reggiano. This pizza is rich with the black truffle paste and mozarella and ham. The base is thin and the pizzas are large and man sized which is good value for $23.
Spettacolo $23
The spettacolo pizza comes topped with fresh sliced tomatoes, mozarella, rocket and proscuitto de Parma. The fresh tomatoes means that the vase goes quite soggy but this pizza is the favourite of the girls.
I grab a hand from two of the girls and the other one grabs my skirt and we all leave without a scowl from a waiter or fellow diner.
So tell me Dear Reader, do you find ever get scowls from waiters and if so, why?
Cavallino Ristorante
1 Yulong Ave, Terrey Hills NSW
Tel: +61 (02) 9450 1777
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35 Comments | Add your own
Oh that looks like fun. I’m sad we missed out!
We ate at Catalina yesterday with our little girl…. and it’s not very toddler friendly. But everyone was really welcoming.
Lacey fell asleep, and I asked the waiter, “Do you have a cot?” with a serious face.. and she didn’t know what to say.
I said I was joking and we all laughed.
Oh, probably the only time I got a scowl from a waiter was when I grabbed his sleeve and used it to mop up the soy sauce I’d spilled all over my plate, then poked a chopstick in his ear.
Okay, I have no idea where that came from. Maybe the problem in my toe has affected my brain? I usually try to be very obsequious with waiters, especially when asking for allergy-adaptions, so bad attitudes are rare. It tends to work!
Also, yum! I do love me some capers. I used to eat them from the jar as a kid.
Hmmm…I’m not a fan of soggy panzanella salad either. Certainly seems child-friendly though, especially if they’ll let the kids sit on the counter and watch them cook!
This restaurant looks like the absolute perfect choice to please kiddies and grown-ups alike! The pasta looks so flavorful, and I’d love to watch the pizza being made too!
That sure looks like a great kid friendly place
oooh and that cheese fridge – HEAVEN!
My sister recently ate there and they loved the pizzas. Love the cheese fridge!!
Hello NQN
I was distracted from the lovely food by all those adorable children!
It always makes me happy seeing kids out with their families just doing and experiencing things together.
Sounds like it was a lovely day.
BTW – thanks for you taste photo essay. It was a great day and your photos were very helpful.
I am off to a Food Safari tour this coming weekend too.
Cheers and hugs
SSG xxx
Sounds like the perfect place to get good food and take kids, without being uncomfortable. Great review Lorraine.
pastas sounds great. perhaps even better than Il Baretto?
Food looks yummy and the place looks very nice indeed.
Being a waitress myself I have to hold it in sometimes when I deal with idiotic customers.
However, when I was working at this one place there were idiots everywhere (seriously) and they would treat you with no respect at all. I had one guy try to whistle me over as if I was some kind of dog! So yeah I gave him a filthy because I wasn’t going to tolerate that and he was lucky I didn’t give him a word of my mind.
thank you… more kid friendly restaurant write ups please thanks!
Oh fantastic! So good to know, I would never have known this place existed, and it’s so close!
My lil one is now 17 and it is really lovely to see more good quality restaurants welcoming children. I must admit I have never been in a situatiion where I have felt uncomfortable while he was growing up at fine dining establishments and he has been joining us since he was born.
The food looks wonderful and I love the fact the girls got to watch the pizza making. Cheese fridge rocks
Thanks Lorraine for sharing, is somewhere on the list to go with my girlfriend and her 3yr old
I can not go out any where with my grandson Kaleb with out him embarrassing us. He has been taught manners but he chooses to misbehave. As a result, he no longer goes out with us when we go to a restaurant. His mother can take him , but we will not.
Gorgeous looking place… though Terrey Hills is such a long way away for me. There needs to be more kid friendly places around Sydney. The staff don’t need to be babysitters but at least have things to keep the kids entertained, friend and I were at dinner on Friday night and the table next to us had their kids running around and flipping chairs all over the place. Felt bad for the kids they must have been bored!
I love hearing about restaurants that are kid friendly. So I can avoid them
Recently my friends and I not only got scowls but we overheard waitstaff talking about us! Two of my friends got different (crap) bread with their breakfast than what they were expecting, and asked to change it, which apparently was a huge inconvenience. They did it, but it was quite unpleasant. I will not be returning to the place in question!
My family in Sydney are foodies and so our kids get taken to lots of restaurants. Top marks to Giovanni Pilu’s resturant at Freshwater and Buon Ricordo where the waiters didn’t scowl even when little feet were propped on the table.
this sounds like a wonderful place, for the whole family to enjoy… The food looks great, and I love that they get the children to watch them Preparing the pizza .
Thanks for sharing
Agree with Cavillano’s – great food and some of the best pizzas..but they have strange bookings system – before 6.30 or after 8.15… Yet when you are there you see some tables arriving at 7 and 7.15 etc – must be friends of someone or someone in the know but it is a bit disappointing
Little girls eating pizza with prosciutto de parma makes my heart sing. When I see kids eating nuggets made with chicken “product” I want to scream “child abuse.”
i’ve had horrible experiences with wait-staff, and i am super-duper lovely and considerate all the time.
that said, when they are mean re: my munchkin, hell hath no fury.
Thank you for this reveiw! My sister in law has booked this place for her birthday dinner in 2 weeks and after checking out the website I was VERY worried it would’nt be toddler friendly. Now I’m looking forward to going to a ‘fancy’ resturant and not having to worry about my little girl disrubting everyone.
Waiters always scowl at me when I ask for either tomato sauce or sweet chilli for my omelette, surely it is not too much of an extravagant request. Another great post NQN!
That pasta sounds especially great! What a kid-friendly place!
What a lovely place to go. Watching pizza getting made still makes me excited. I think waiters can be very scowly when they want to be, and the more you pay the more the waiters seem to scowl. Maybe it’s because I whip my camera out that sets them off sometimes?!
more child-friendly where they mean actual food and NOT nuggets and chips!
Love that there are more options for great food up my way! The Upper North Shore has such a lack of great dining out options. I don’t need fancy, I just need GOOD. I am really excited by this place – I can’t wait to visit!
In answer to your question, I seem to go to a lot of places that have disapproving wait staff. I think it’s mostly when I go out with a group of friends that might be a little on the loud side. So maybe it really is us and not them…!
Mrs NQN, when are you going to publish a book, with your interesting comments and sumptious photography???!!
I totally agree, no nuggets! Awesome!
if the waiters want a decent tip from this gal, there will be no scowling!
any place with a fridge full of cheese is all right by me!
the kids looked like they had fun!
occasionally i get scowls for taking photos and once cause our table created a huge mess; that time the lady owner sure wasn’t shy about it either!
Great idea for testing kid friendly restaurants – I get the same questions and never know how to answer.
So many places to try……..so little time! Cavallino looks great but it’s bordering on ‘pack a picnic basket’ territory to get there for me, if I ever travel that far I’ll keep it in mind. Looks like a perfect spot for home-sick Italians
I sooo thought I had responded to this!
We loved this visit to Cavallino – I have also been on a girls’ night out – they do have a great little cocktail area away from the dining – though can’t vouch for the cocktail list at the bar – it wasn’t done when I visited.
It’s worth a drive – great family restaurant but wouldn’t be a place I would discount if I didn’t like them (kids) I’d just book an 8pm dinner.
the little girl with her pasta is adorable!
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