Oxfordshire and its surrounds are famous for outstanding food and hospitality: from farms, growers and markets, to cafes, pubs and restaurants. We are delighted to have the chance to feature some of the very best.
If you fancy a little taste – a morso? – of Sicily in the heart of Oxford, head straight to Aromi, the new(ish) café occupying space at the Cornmarket end of St Michael’s Street, just a short walk from the Covered Market and main shopping streets.
The Oxford outpost is part of a family-run business that began in Cambridge, inspired by the family’s Sicilian roots and, specifically, the traditions of Caffè Cipriani in Acireale. Aromi describes its food as a combination of family recipes, time-honoured techniques and fresh ingredients, and in Oxford, the food waiting behind the counter is centred around Sicilian-style pizza and focaccia, pastries, gelato and coffee. This isn’t the place to come for a solemn, three-hour meal requiring a lengthy pondering of the menu and a comprehensive knowledge of regional grape varieties, but this is exactly sort of food you want to grab for a quick lunch, or informal supper without compromising on taste or quality.
The first thing to establish is that this is not food designed to be admired as it nestles prettily on its plate. It is food to pick up, tear apart and get stuck into. I went with a friend on a busy Thursday lunchtime and joined the queue of hungry diners ordering from the counter.
We began with a Cordini, as recommended by the lovely manager, Bonina. If you haven’t already had the pleasure, this is a citrus sharp, tangy aperitif that performs exactly as a pre-lunch drink should. It teases the palette. Beer and wine are available, but after a quick cheers – or ‘saluti’ – we both opted for the cold, organic limonata. Happily, there was none of the cloying sweetness that can make lemonade feel more like a pudding than a drink, and it isn't aggressively carbonated either. It is simply lemony and refreshing.
We got on with the business of eating. First, the arancini, which are immediately striking. These are not dainty little rice balls intended merely to keep hunger at bay while you decide what else to order. They are substantial things, the sort of portion that could easily and very reasonably constitute a meal in itself.
The ragù version is particularly satisfying. The rice has that slightly sticky, almost gooey quality that makes arancini so comforting, but there is also texture and bite. The filling is properly meaty, while the deep-fried crumb coating creates a crisp, almost brittle shell. Crunchy outside, soft and rich within, packing enough flavour to make you understand why Sicilian food is famous for its vibrant flavours and bold contrasts.
The spinach arancini offer a gentler counterpoint. There is still that pleasingly substantial rice-and-crust combination, but the spinach brings freshness and a savoury earthiness to the filling. Again, it is the difference in textures that makes the dish work: crisp exterior giving way to a soft centre.
If the arancini demonstrate Aromi's ability to make a snack feel like a proper meal, the pizza demonstrates its mastery with dough.
Our margherita arrived on a crunchy focaccia-style base, carrying fresh herbs and a generous layer of oozy mozzarella. The tomato sauce is sweet, but crucially it actually tastes of tomatoes. That sounds like a low bar, but it’s one that too many pizzas fail to clear. Here there is proper tomato flavour, balanced by a little acidity to stop it feeling too sugary.
Food is served warm, rather than volcanically hot, which is another small but important point of pleasure. You can actually taste it immediately. The mozzarella remains soft and unctuous, the herbs provide an aromatic lift, and the crispness of the base gives the whole thing structure.
And then came the unexpected winner. I love it when a restaurant manages to surprise you with something that, on paper, sounds like the supporting act. Here, it was the griddled courgette pizza. There is no tomato to provide the obvious sweetness or acidity or even cheese to give creamy goodness. Instead, the dish relies simply on the courgette itself: dulcet slabs of silky-smooth vegetables, beautifully seasoned, scattered with oregano, and piled over crisp focaccia-like dough. I appreciate it may sound as if I’m going a little over the top, but my gosh, it’s good. It is simple food, but it’s not simplistic. There is a real confidence in relying on a single ingredient to carry a dish rather than burying it under cheese, meat or sauce. Portions are substantial and flavours are full, but across the board the appeal lies in the underlying sense that the ingredients are doing the work.
It’s also worth highlighting that Aromi's own description of its dough talks about a slow 48-hour fermentation, designed to produce a lighter, more digestible sourdough. As far as I was concerned, the resulting bases have enough crispness, chew and flavour to feel satisfying in their own right, never mind if they’re carrying all the toppings on the menu, or just one.
Onto dessert, which had to be the classics (tiramisù and cannoli), although the choice was spoiling. I’m mentally planning my return visit, ideally on a lazy weekend morning to snaffle up at least one of the pastries or cornetto.
The tiramisù is a particularly good example of tradition at its finest. Moist and dense, there is enough structure for it to hold its shape, but it is still wonderfully yielding when you cut into it. It tastes grown-up, with a restrained sweetness which means you can finish it without feeling like you’ve been mugged by the sugar bowl.
The cannoli are a different proposition. We tried two: one with a slightly spiced ricotta filling, the other a luxuriously rich pistachio paste. Both were made from pastry which was deliciously crisp and biscuity. After downing half the tiramisu, I didn’t think I’d be able to manage more than a bite of cannoli, strictly ‘for research purposes’, but somehow both quietly disappeared from the plate leaving just a few crumbs in their wake.
We finished with a coffee. A really excellent cortado; hot, strong and rich. It was exactly the right punctuation mark after lunch, readying us for the rest of the day with a properly assertive hit of caffeine.
Aromi isn't trying to make every dish into a culinary concept. The food here is all about the familiar – arancini, pizza, focaccia, tiramisu, pastries, coffee – getting the care and attention it deserves.
The St Michael's Street location is explicitly designed as a café, with counter service, shared seating, and takeaway options. Somewhere you can drop into for a coffee and pastry, a snack or an informal meal.
I’ll end by admitting I tried and failed to get the recipe for that tiramisu. This was all they’d tell me: “Our homemade tiramisù is freshly prepared every day, following the classic Italian recipe using freshly brewed Sicilian coffee, mascarpone mousse, Savoiardi biscuits, and a dusting of cocoa powder.” Fair enough, I’ll just have to keep going back until I figure it out. I can think of worse ways of spending my time…
