La Lampara - CAROVIGNO

We were looking for a typical apulean dinner. Low cost as it looked from premises and service and table dressing, but hoping for genuine local professional expertise. The wine (of the house) was cheap, indeed, but really low quality with a hue of toxicity. Not italian standards, lest apulian high level quality. The pasta dishes were ok for pasta standards, insufficient for presentation and cooking. If you want to taste what li guine cozze e vongole are, eat somewhere else. Too much salt added, ok for mussels, still a lot of water in the pasta. Bearable. Grilled swordfish was ok, not enough flavours added. Frittura mista eas ok. Top of the bottoms was grilled octopus eith fries. Octopus was not cleaned not enough grilled. It was not rare, rather superficially grilled. Fries were commercial, well below national standards in italy and more so on the rest of europe and us. Despite sending back the uncooked plate ee were charged wifh no understanding nor understanding. Charge was 30€/each. If you are italian, look for a different place…..if you are visiting and forced, onli take the fried menu, no wine and at most a local beer.

Restaurant does not look of much, but once you enter, you feel this is right spot. Simple, but cozy and good, tasty dishes. Best fish and seafood. Nice, smiling staff. Very, very fair prices.

Towards the end of the season, Specchiolla is pretty quiet and La Lampara was one of the few places that seemed to be open on a Monday lunchtime. Specchiolla also has a crazy one-way system, but that's another story. We both chose plates of fish (octopus, calamari, prawns and other small fish) with chips at 10 euro each. Portions were appropriate for lunch and the fish was fresh with just a light coating of batter. A litre of local white wine was a mere 5 euro. Overall, we thought it good value and we'll be back to buy some sea bass from the fresh fish counter.

Cheap and cheerful seafood pasta, fritto misto etc in the cafe plus fresh fish from the wet fish counter to buy and take away. The red shrimps are really sweet, gorgeous. Interesting decor....easy parking. Small gelateria almost next door has lovely icecream.

Fresh fish cooked at the moment. simple but well maintained service. great choice from the menu. courteous and helpful staff. Spartan tables but well organized. kitchen open from noon until afternoon. to try the baked cream. excellent value for money.