Osteria Sanso Restaurant

Post

Subscribe

If someone had told me I'd be spending the evening of a rather significant birthday in Kanmantoo, I'd have told them not to be ridiculous. That's exactly what happened though, due to a serendipitous comment from a friend.

I'd been lamenting the fact that few restaurants near my home on the Fleurieu Peninsula are open on a Wednesday evening and I was now far too old to drive to Adelaide and back for my mid-week birthday celebration. 'Why not go to Kanmantoo?' asked my friend.

The small town of Kanmantoo, population around 700, is 50km south-east of Adelaide, and quite close to Nairne. The town is famous for its long history of copper mining, dating back to 1846. These days it's also known for its very special Italian restaurant known as Osteria Sanso.



The restaurant is on the main street in Kanmantoo, opposite the Kanmantoo Hall which was built in 1864. The restaurant is housed in a building dating back to 1848. Plenty of history here.



There's off-street parking in a leafy garden space right outside a couple of cute cottages.

The cottages are part of a package involving Osteria Sanso. For $300 on a weeknight, you can enjoy a three-course meal for yourself and a friend or partner, one night's accommodation in a cottage and a continental breakfast.



We arrived at our cottage in the late afternoon to settle in and go for a walk before dinner. The cottage was spacious with a small lounge area, en-suite bathroom and a comfy bed with crisp, white sheets.



The small but adequate kitchen area was stocked with cereals, fresh bread, Hahndorf honey and jams but alas no coffee machine. I've become spoilt in my travels in this last decade and now I expect a coffee machine in my hotel room. I'd rather poke sticks in my eyes than open a packet of cremated coffee. I took a deep breath and had a quiet word to myself; 'get over it, at least there's nice teabags'.



We'd also brought along a nice bottle of pre-dinner wine, so we enjoyed a drink on our balcony listening to the birds. It helped me get over the coffee issue.

We thought we might be the only customers at the restaurant that evening. It was a Wednesday after all and we were a long way from a major town. The restaurant owner, Tony Sanso, however, is held in high esteem by all he has cooked for during his long and illustrious career. Needless to say, there were many other diners enjoying Tony's authentic Tuscan-style fare that night.



Our package allowed us to choose anything from the menu with no restrictions. I chose a starter from the daily specials; fresh sea scallops cooked in white wine. Divine.



My husband claimed his prawn starter was the pick of the evening and I must admit the prawn he donated to me tasted luscious.



He chose 'Maccheroni al Ragu', (tube pasta with a Tuscan meat sauce) while I chose 'Agnolotti alla Vegetariana' (a housemade pasta with ricotta cheese & spinach filling) for our main course. Sides were also included in our package, so we chose a sautéed mushroom dish and a rocket salad. A second bottle of wine is mandatory for significant birthdays, so we ordered a Tuscan red to enjoy with the pasta.



I didn't really need dessert but it was my happy birthday and it was included in our generous package, so of course, I indulged. I'd had a dessert course of Vin Santo and almond biscuits in Tuscany a few years ago. It's a bit like having a liqueur as well as a dessert, so I happily dipped the biscuits and sipped the sweet wine. Oh yes, there was a spoonful or so of my husband's tiramisu involved also.



Our meal was sublime; fresh, flavoursome and authentic. I was transported back to Tuscany in my mind for a moment there. That may have been due to the extra wine. It was after dinner that the highlight of the evening presented itself in the form of Tony Sanso himself. He sat with us and chatted, in his softly spoken manner, about his life, his family and career.

Now 81 years old, Tony came to Australia in 1964 after cooking for many notables in Paris and London. He ran a string of restaurants around Adelaide over the following five decades.

My husband is a drummer with jazz music in his ancestry and a chord was struck immediately when Tony realised he had known my late father-in-law Billy. As part of the Adelaide 'furniture' in the late 1960's and 70's Tony knew all the musos, foodies and larger-than-life characters back in the day. Many colourful stories ensued as the two men bonded over glasses of grappa.



It was a delightful birthday evening for me, followed by a comfy night's sleep in the cottage. And I was home by 10am drinking good coffee.

#escape_the_city
#nairne
#greater_adelaide
#food_wine
#italian_restaurants
#restaurants
%wnadelaide