The lively backyard of Valley Arcade, Nairobi

La Salumeria restaurant, whose speciality is Italian cold cuts of meat, and other deli products. PHOTO | JOHN FOX | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • The owner and manager of La Salumeria is Davide Buranello.
  • A “salumeria” is a place that sells “salumi” — especially Italian cold cuts of meat and other deli products.

La Salumeria in Valley Arcade, along Gitanga Road, is one of my favourite restaurants in Nairobi. It’s been there for 20 years and, apart from a few places within walking distance of my office in Lavington Shopping Centre, I have been there more times than any other restaurant in the city.

It has an ambience that is warm, welcoming and homely. And its Italian cuisine is excellent. (If Heaven was populated by only European nationalities, then the English would be the police, Germans would be the engineers, French would be the lovers, and Italians would be the cooks. I will leave you to work out how their roles would be reversed in Hell.)

IMPRESSED

The owner and manager of La Salumeria is Davide Buranello. He told me that a “salumeria” is a place that sells “salumi” — especially Italian cold cuts of meat and other deli products. Well, one evening there last week I was so impressed with the taste and softness of the Parma ham served in the antipasto that I asked Davide where he gets it from.

He told me that it is from Flavio Trali, who has the New Italycor shop just round the corner of the Dhanjay Apartments and on the ground floor, like Davide’s restaurant.

So at the weekend I decided to visit Flavio’s shop. The shelves and coolers were stacked with Italian goodies: various cold cuts, lots of cheeses, pasta, and row upon row of fine Italian wines. And I went away with a packet of thinly sliced Parma ham.

I walked across the car park to where I could hear the staccato noise of youths at play.

NO ALCOHOL

This is ArenaOne, where my son, Jan (no longer a youth), plays five-a-side football a couple of evenings a week.

I stopped to read the advertising board, which tells us that it is open seven days a week and that the rules are: no fighting, no alcohol, no smoking, no drugs. It promises a “family friendly environment”.

ArenaOne has three astro turf pitches and also the Climb BlueSky outdoor climbing tower. There is an excellent website (www.arenaone.co.ke), I was later to discover, which moves almost as frenetically as a fast game of five-a-side football.

It has an interview with Zuhum Omar, the Head of Operations. He talks about how ArenaOne is in line with similar ventures he has seen in the UK and Malaysia. “It’s a better alternative for youngsters,” he says, “than just hanging out”.

The price for the five-a-side football is Sh4,000 per hour per group — which means Sh400 per person. At weekends the price is lowered to Sh2,500. The charge for the climbing tower is Sh700.

CAPPUCCINO

After peeking through the wire fences at the ongoing games at ArenaOne, I stopped for a cappuccino at the little cafe alongside. It’s called Gyros 2 Go. Its speciality is a wide variety of wraps. The chicken gyro, for example, comes with tzatziki, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, sweet pickles, sour pickles, hot peppers, mild peppers, roasted eggplant, hummus, garlic sauce and chilli sauce.

They offer gluten free wraps as well as gluten-free pizzas. And they serve the alcohol not allowed in the ArenaOne neighbourhood.

But I settled for just the cappuccino because I had a table booked that evening at La Salumeria.

I might have given the wrong impression about Davide’s place, after I introduced it as a deli with its cold cuts of meat and other “salumi” products.

LAMB CHOPS

Its menu is much more eclectic than that. Along with the different pastas there are imaginatively topped pizzas, beef steaks, lamb chops, chicken breasts, and many vegetarian specialities.

The desserts are tempting, too. Yummy reviewers speak well of the Tiramisu, but I rarely stray beyond the affogato coffee.

Davide told us that in a few months he will be opening a wine bar next door in the Dhanjay Apartments.

So the back yard of Valley Arcade will have yet another attraction.

John Fox is Managing Director of iDC.