La Veranda

The seafood platter is good and copious. The sauce is a bit too salty. Caesar salad was correct. Their pastas are al dente and not overcooked which is quite rare in Lagos. The prices are on the high side.

Lebanese chef prepared really good pasta with truffles. Nice, clean, efficient. I recommend.

A beautiful place to be with a welcoming atmosphere. I enjoyed my time in there. The pizza taste good and the cheese cake was awesome

La Veranda Italian Cuisine/Restaurant is part of the leisure and hospitality entity known as The Blowfish Group. This comprises of a hotel- The Blowfish Hotel, 9-7 Supermarket and about 5/6 Restaurants. The Restaurants include: Izanagi Japanese Restaurant, Woks Asian Cuisine, Seabass Seafood Restaurant, Velvett Grill Lounge & Bar, Mahawis Lebanese Grill and of course- La Veranda Italian Cuisine. A Purple Restaurant was also listed, but don't know if it's still operational, or the name changed. La Veranda and Woks Asian are located inside The Blowfish Hotel, while the others are situated in and around the same street. There's also 'The Poolside by Blowfish'- a casual/sports bar type eatery by the hotel pool. I had the pleasure of dining at Izanagi Japanese Restaurant a few years back; (you can read my separate review of it on TripAdvisor). Even though I knew The Blowfish Group had a number of restaurants, I had no idea an Italian Restaurant was a part of them. On this visit to Lagos, I was with 2 of my daughters who happen to love Italian food, so a google search of Italian Cuisine on Lagos Island brought us to La Veranda. The restaurant is located above/opposite the pool area, just by an adorable children's playground surrounded by lush greenery. You access it via a staircase. The restaurant was lovely, with an elevated, breathtaking, 'deep blue' backdrop of Blowfish Hotel's swimming pool. Service was fast and efficient, but our main criticism was that we were not informed that there was a non-smoking seating area. We ended up sitting in the smoking area and got simultaneously bombarded by the second hand cigarette and shisha smoke of two different sets of customers. Had we known this, we would have asked to be seated in the non-smoking section of La Veranda. They had outdoor, as well as indoor seating. La Veranda Italian Cuisine has an awesome menu featuring numerous Italian Classics. It comprised of 14 ANTIPASTI, 9 SALADS, 2 SOUPS, 20 PASTAS, 6 STEAKS, 8 MAIN COURSES, 3 PIATTI DELLA CASA (HOUSE DISHES), 12 CLASSIC PIZZAS, 3 VEGETARIAN PIZZAS, 3 WHITE PIZZAS, 2 SIDE DISHES, 6 DESSERTS, 3 MILKSHAKES, FRESH JUICES, COFFEE & TEA, 4 MOCKTAILS, SPECIALTY SHOTS, COCKTAILS, and a heck of a lot of ALCOHOL, plus a sizeable SHISHA selection. We were a party of 3, so for our Starters, we ordered the ARANCINI (a rustic, Italian favorite, crispy bites of risotto, breaded mozzarella cheese, served with creamy balsamic sauce for dipping), SHRIMP SCAMPI FRITTA (hand-breaded & fried shrimp lightly tossed with garlic & a butter lemon sauce) and BASTONCINI DI MOZZARELLA (MOZZARELLA SQUARES). We also ordered a Classic Pizza- the FRUTTI DI MARE (tomato, mozzarella, shrimps, calamari, garlic, chilli). For our Mains, we ordered the PENNE AL PESTO (penne pasta tossed with homemade basil pesto sauce), a TAGLIATELLE CON POLLO (thinly sliced chicken breast, sauteed mushrooms in a fresh cream sauce, over a bed of pasta ribbons) and the RAVIOLI DE LA CASA (homemade fresh ravioli filled with ricotta & spinach, prepared with a mushroom, creamy rosa sauce). For our drinks, we got 2 Mocktails, the BERRY GO ROUND (raspberry, mint) and VERANDA PASSION (passionfruit, strawberry, orange), and one VANILLA MILKSHAKE. We got a takeaway order for our driver. It was, the SPHAGHETTI ALLA BOLOGNESE (sphaghetti topped with a hearty tomato meat sauce & fresh basil) and a MIXED GREEN SALAD (mixed lettuce tossed in our signature lemon vinaigrette with tomatoes, green pepper, cucumber & olives). The Starters were good, but for the Arancini, I expected the creamy balsamic glaze to come as a side dipping sauce, as opposed to being drizzled on the Arancini. It had an unappealing color that looked like a caramel sauce. I also thought that the Shrimp Scampi would be a tad bit more fried than it was. The Mozzarella Squares were imcredible. The Seafood Pizza was delicious, however, the pizza crust/base was a little on the thin side and there wasn't enough calamari on it. My Ravioli was amazing- so smooth and creamy, but the portion was on the small side. My daughter didn't like her Vanilla Milkshake. She found it to be too sweet and quite grainy with tiny pellets of ice in it. They both really enjoyed their Tagliatelle and Penne Pesto. The Mocktails were very good- fruity and refreshing. Our dining experience at La Veranda Italian Cuisine was overall, a rather pleasant one. As previously mentioned, the main 'hiccup' we had was other diners blowing smoke in our direction, and that was very unfortunate and super annoying. None of the staffers wore name tags, so I can't identify them in this review, but the service at La Veranda was generally quite impressive. The food is without a doubt truly authentic Italian Cuisine! 👌🏽 Even though Italian Food doesn't quite make my list of 'Top Ten Favorite Cuisines' in the world, I look forward to visiting La Veranda Restaurant again; sometime in the near future! 😄 Highly, highly recommended!!!