He’s opened a casual restaurant at Telok Ayer Street called Chicco Pasta Bar, offering not just hearty plates of carbohydrates but also focaccia and sharing platters of Italian street food like roasted cauliflower with garlic chilli sauce, meatballs, salmon tartare, and cold cuts and cheese. Meats from the grill are available at dinner time.
Chicco is “a very, very no-stress restaurant you don’t have to get dressed up for”, in contrast to the slightly more formal vibe at Cenzo, which fans of Nocente’s previous restaurant Salted & Hung will connect more easily with his style of cooking. He still spends most of his time behind the pass at Cenzo, but pops into Chicco quite regularly.
Here, “It’s quality food done properly, in a nice setting. You can sit down, have a drink, chill out and relax. If you’re in a rush, you can just have a quick bowl of pasta. I still feel Singapore has a lot of restaurants but they are always pushing more high-end, like, you’ve got to dress up and spend a fortune. This is more a place to have a peaceful date night or something easy to eat – nothing too over-the-top. It’s still the ethos of Cenzo of quality over quantity, but just a little bit more price-friendly; a little bit more relaxed.”