Riva Restaurant London SW13 and the Cotechino Sausage

⏱ 3 min read

Riva has been a top London Italian restaurant for more than 30 years and I believe its abiding success is its consistently good food served well in lovely surroundings. Dedicated staff in spotless white aprons, spotless white tablecloths, simple wooden chairs and decor, sparklingly clean glasses and always a huge and fabulous vase of flowers and foliage positioned near the entrance are all stand out features. And on top of all of that, the food is consistently good, rather like the very best of home cooking. They still serve delicious bread at the beginning of the meal with un-salted butter at the perfect temperature, cold but perfectly spreadable and consistently excellent, I have always noticed it and liked it. They know exactly what they are doing here.

Once you are settled with drinks and the bread and butter there comes the description of the specials. It is the highlight for me, I love it and always aim to choose both a first and second course from the expertly described list which might include:  puntarella salad with anchovy dressing, risotto made with lobster shell stock but no lobster, ravioli stuffed with crab and served with cherry tomatoes and peas, or perhaps suckling pig with roast potatoes. 

On a visit during the Christmas and New Year holidays I tried what might have sounded to some like the most unappealing item on the list of specials, but my experience told me that was exactly what to choose. A seasonal speciality from Lombardy, a special cotechino pork sausage which is first cooked in its skin and then removed from the skin, sliced and fried and served with Mostarda di Frutta and brown lentils. The lentils having been simmered in the stock resulting from the cooking of the sausage. Accompanied by a glass of excellent house red wine, it was one of the best things I have eaten at any restaurant. No room for anything else but, if ever I do have a dessert it, has to be the Cinnamon Ice-Cream with Amaretti and Balsamic Vinegar and that is that.

Can’t make it to Riva?

I have since discovered  the excellent Swaledale Butchers www.swaledale.co.uk where you can order delicious cotechino sausages online and have them delivered on a specified day. The website has all the information on how to store and cook them too. Then all you need is to slice and fry the sausage and cook the lentils. I couldn’t get hold of the Frutta di Mostarda, so I improvised with a salad of baby spinach leaves and a mustard, honey and olive oil dressing. It all went very well.

See also: – Green or Brown Rustic Lentils

If you want a healthier and more environmentally friendly diet, a good start would be to cook from scratch, avoid buying ready-processed meals, and so avoid foods with a high sugar and salt content. Have a look at food labels, you will likely be amazed by how much salt and sugar is included and, worse, how many of the ingredients are not recognisable as food.

Sherbhert champions delicious, healthy and sustainable food where its production minimises environmental damage, exploitation, animal suffering and subsequent processing. Sherbhert’s recipes are simple and use mainly UK seasonal produce sourced as locally as possible and organically produced where possible.Sherbhert occasionally recommends suppliers entirely because of their good produce and ethos.