La Caravella

We visited La Caravella with our 8 year old daughter for Sunday lunch and to celebrate our wedding anniversary. We've sampled most restaurants in Thame over the years, and this one is definitely a cut above. Delicious food (not your standard "Italian" with bored teenage staff serving tasteless pasta-n-pizza), good portion sizes, fair prices, attentive but unobtrusive service, and nicely decorated. The clincher was that our daughter, normally a very fussy eater, absolutely loved her spaghetti bolognese and generous three balls of gelato. She was less keen on her bread and dips starter - the crust was too hard and there were "herby bits" - but we figured two out of three was a great result. My only constructive suggestion would be for the restaurant to try and offer something to keep the kids amused, if the server spots that the parents' efforts aren't working. It doesn't have to be fancy or costly: perhaps just a simple Italian-themed memory game or a drawing to colour in, or if the staff are not too busy, most children would appreciate something a bit different, like a tour of the kitchen with one of the parents to say hello and see how their food is made. Family life and general cost-of-living pressures mean we can't go out to eat as often as we'd like, but we will definitely be returning to La Caravella.