Remember my German lad Lukas? Yes, the one who keeps insisting that Erdinger beer is simply the best gift from the Gods. It turns out that beer was the only thing on his mind - what an utter bore. I simply had to stop this booze madness and so I told him how I preferred Italian men instead.

Days later Lukas actually called to inform me of my blind date with an Italiano. I was to meet him at Enotria for dinner. I've not been to this restaurant before but I have heard that they do serve some pretty authentic Italian cuisine.

I soon found out just how authentic the food was when I finally met up with Pete at Enotria's on a cool Saturday night. Enotria happened to be Pete's favourite place to have a real mean tiramisu and I know I would have to agree completely. But first, let me wax lyrical about their main courses.

Since I was feeling like eating some mushrooms, I ordered the Ai Funghi, a thin crusted oven baked pizza with champignon and porcini mushrooms with mozzarella cheese and tomato sauce. These slices of heaven were oozing with such delicate aroma that I could almost see Pete's eye watching the pizza with greedy eyes. They were rather generous with the mushrooms, which looked and tasted pretty fresh to me.

Oh, and guess what, I decided to be kind to the animals today and ordered the insalata di gamberi con avocado ecaviale (prawn salad with avocado and caviar). Sounds decadent doesn't it? I loved the juicy sweet prawns that gave the salad extra bite. Did I mention that I eat my prawns with the shells? Yummy, I think the crunchy texture is highly appealing. And of course the avocado gave the entire salad a creamy texture and the caviar tasted great too.

Pete, being the true blue Italiano that he is, ordered the Linguine al pesto alla Genovese (linguine pasta with basil pesto sauce, long beans and potato) and Ravioli dim agro al pomodoro (stuffed pasta with ricotta cheese in tomato sauce).

That's right, I know what you're thinking - it probably looks as if he isn't going to finish them both. But guess what, he had ordered both because he wanted to let me have a taste of both pastas. Both were his favourite he said.

I'm very much a pasta person and have always preferred my pasta al dente and now comes the ultimate test. I tried the linguine and was immediately treated to some beautifully cooked pasta that had all the bite it needed. This is what I'm talking about - true blue Italian food, with the pasta not too overcooked. It helped that the simply basil pesto sauce wasn't too overpowering and simply gave the linguine enough herb and olive oil taste.

The ravioli was another head-turner. Stuffed with ricotta cheese, these were to die for, literally. I couldn't get enough of the tomato base which gave a rather orange-red colour. I later found out from the chef that he had actually blended carrots and celery with the tomatoes to give it a more fragrant taste. Excellent. Now you see why you can never go wrong with eating pasta at a truly good Italian restaurant? That's because they know their stuff.

Oh I promised to fill you in on the tiramisu didn't I? On this note, I'll have to express my gratitude to dear ol' Pete for bringing me to Enotria. For it is here that I found the best tiramisu ever (see pic above). I loved how it wasn't too dense and they didn't put too much liquor. Even the mascarpone cheese was lighter than usual. Having had plenty of disastrous tasting tiramisus, I finally had my faith in Italian desserts restored after trying Enotria's version. What an excellent 'pick me up'!

By the end of the entire dinner, I was feeling rather lethargic and rather sorry that I didn't get to chat with Pete much. He was on the phone most of the time. I guess he's a busy person. Anyway, I doubt that's the last I'll see of him. I have to ask him to recommend more Italian places. But more about that for another time.