Dining Out 013: Tom's Pasta

Dinner in Hackney.

Do you know how difficult it is to get nine women between the ages of 28 and 33 all of whom live in London, and work in industries ranging from teaching to wine, in the same room? The answer is: very.

Despite the near impossibility of this feat, however, my friends and I managed it recently, for a dinner at Tom’s Pasta, at Hackney Downs Studios. I talk a lot in Dining Out about the specific scenarios I love to eat in, and why, and how, but honestly despite all of my handwringing, I’m not sure that anything actually beats being among a big, loud group of people you care about and want to catch up with, over chunky slices of bread.

After lengthy negotiations in a group chat that springs to life around social events – it’s finally hot out so nature (our WhatsApp) is healing – we managed to settle on a date when everyone was free, which in itself, as mentioned, is like completing one of the trials of Hercules. As such, when it happens, it’s basically like Christmas, and we approached it as such. 

Though we had eyeballed the date months in advance, as fate would have had it, we had decided on one of the first proper hot days that London had this year (it’s now, of course, Full Summer and I am writing to you with no trousers on; I believe the formal term for the fit is the “Winnie the Pooh”). We all filed up to Hackney, and Hannah, Hayley, Eloise, Bex and I were early, so we drank Aperol and spicy margs out on wooden benches in front of the restaurant. When Elise arrived she said that she couldn’t see us on her approach, but she could tell where we were because she’d heard my laugh. As soon as she sat down she said the words “May I ‘av… a cigarette?” in a French accent as if that made the request more reasonable. As time went on, Moya, Imogen, and Annie joined us too, and when it came time for our table we trooped into the restaurant, over the lovely wooden decking of the terrace – new-looking, like the handiwork of your one mate who is bang into his garden and keeps inviting everyone around for BBQs – where people on dates or in small groups were merrily shovelling twirls of tagliatelle and big chunks of lasagna in their gobs. 

Our table was booked inside and once everyone had selected a seat, we went about the business of catching up – via a useful and novel system designed by Moya whereby each person was given a timed minute to discuss the topics “love” “work” and “other”* – and then went about the even more important business of selecting our food. 

My order, in the end, was pretty simple. Elise and I had a portion of sourdough with Parmesan butter (essentially butter whipped with grated Parmesan), then I flew solo with a wedge of beef shin and nduja lasagna, and we shared a green salad. To end, we finished up with a slice of ever-so-slightly wibbly tiramisu.

The main thing I want to say about Tom’s Pasta is that though it is a pasta restaurant, it does not have all the features of a trattoria – it’s too British for that, and too of its place and time (the terrace was populated with the big scrunchies, oversized shirts and wraparound sunnies that have come to define millennial style in summer 2024, which should give you a sense of the clientele). And can I just shock you? I liked that about it. 

Where a traditional trattoria is dark and close, Tom’s is bright and open. And at the same time it’s not a small plates pasta spot in line with Padella or Bancone, either. It’s kind of its own thing, and all the better for it. The portions are big, and every plate of pasta comes absolutely blitzed with Parmesan unless requested otherwise, and there’ll be something that everyone likes. It would, I imagine, be a wonderful place to pop in with a friend or live-in lover if you happened to be close by, especially on a long, languid summer evening when there’s space to sit outdoors and luxuriate over ravioli in sage butter. The whole experience, from the atmosphere to the cute ceramic bowl that our green salad was served in – doused in balsamic (for me? Perfect) – felt like going for dinner at a friend’s incredibly nice but chill gaff. It was casual and we felt like we could chat and laugh as loudly as we wanted, and so did everyone else in the place. 

The food followed suit, in that it was that most wonderful of things: homely. It has been my great luck and joy to have tried a lot of mad dishes at beautiful restaurants with sleek, clean decor in my time – desserts with cauliflower, coriander lassi, all sorts – and while I’ll always enjoy eating in that way, because it’s so impressive and surprising, it’s not the type of thing you necessarily hanker for afterwards. You’re more just glad to have experienced it, in the same way that you’re pleased to have seen a piece of art or watched a specific musician play.

Cosy, straightforward but well-executed food – like the kind you get at Tom’s – is, however, the type of thing that you catch yourself thinking about again in your quieter moments, when you’re feeling sad or moony. And while, as I mentioned, I don’t see much of the trattoria in Tom’s Pasta in its appearance or layout, it certainly is there in spirit and practice, via the total generosity that goes into this food – it doesn’t scrimp and it’s there to be scoffed rather than analysed or marvelled at. It’s food that loves you back. 

The bread came doorstop thick and pillow-squishy, with four slices between two people, and a generous scraping of butter whipped up with grated Parmesan. My lasagna was also Parmesan-heavy, though I had no complaints there (the mammoth dusting of cheese, as it tends to be, was salty up against the sweetness of the tomato ragu), and I was especially into all of the stringy, slowly-stewed pieces of beef shin that my fork pulled out every time I sank it into the layers of pasta.

A lasagna, of course, should be thick and dense but somehow still completely addictive, and this one managed it (though the zingy salad on the side was a smart addition on mine and Elise’s part). The tiramisu we ate for dessert – also a game of layers – was as light and soft as you’d hope from a pudding designed to come after whacking great bowls of fresh pasta.

And speaking of that pasta, while I can only really give you an informed overview of what I personally ate (or rather: “absolutely fucking inhaled”), I was offered bites here and there “for professional purposes” thanks to my very supportive friends (I would never give anyone any of my pasta I’m afraid, I’m just being honest). A ravioli in sage butter was decadent and utterly classic, and a positively sprightly asparagus tagliatelle with chilli and lemon would have been an excellent bedfellow for the chunkier lasagna, if you did happen to show up in the market for sharing.

I know that a lot of Dining Out readers have been keen to hear specifically about affordable places to eat that still feel special, and I’d put Tom’s Pasta firmly in that category – including the service charge, my food came to a grand total of about £26 (I also spent an additional £19 on wine, because I love wine). It’s outrageous value for food cooked with a massive heart, in surroundings where I just felt extremely comfortable. Having visited in a group, I can tell you that it’s excellent in that context, but I bet it’d be lovely for two, as well. Get a seat on the terrace while it’s hot; you won’t care that you’re not in Italy. In fact, you might even venture that London’s better. 

* I feel remiss reducing this to a footnote but I want to expound so it seems most appropriate. It is so cool hearing about all of the things your pals are up to. I do sometimes wonder what the fuck it is I am doing – I am after all a single 30-year-old with a blog, for Christ’s sake – but honestly when I consider who the kind, interesting people I call my peers and friends are, I am struck by the fact that I have been both incredibly lucky and, seemingly, going about at least some things correctly. Apologies for being disgusting, cheers. 

I paid for this visit.

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Dining Out is written by Lauren O’Neill and illustrated by Lucy Letherland. Weekly reviews are free to read every Thursday, but if you’d like to see more, you can subscribe for £5 a month or £50 a year, to get extra content every second Sunday. Click below to see paid and free subscription options, and thanks very much for reading.

See you next week!