Panarottis, Kenilworth Centre

Updated: 08-05-2025

HOUSE REVIEW

I’m from the Northern Suburbs in Cape Town so it’s not often that I would head over to the Southern Suburbs just for pizza. But I got it into my head recently that I wanted pizza and I didn’t want it takeout. So I figured if we got pizza at a family friendly place and stuck my cellphone in my little one’s hands for an hour (don’t judge me, I can see you just rolled your eyes) we would get some peace to eat our pizza fresh and hot like normal folk. Was I ever so wrong…

This halaal banch of Panarotti’s is in the Kenilworth Centre Mall. It’s located on the first floor at the entrance to the parking lot and I suggest using this entrance if that’s the only place you’re going and you have small children with you, and I’ll tell you why. We came up from downstairs and passed those little ride-on horses and cars for small children on the way to Panarotti’s. Suffice it to say, when my little caught a whiff of that, all hope of eating in peace went out the window. Not even sacrificing my data bundle to Thomas the Train Youtube clips could hold him back for any significant length on time.

We got seated and a very patient waiter took our order through a constant refrain of “daddy, I want to ride the chook chook”. Perhaps he was used to this kind of thing. It being “Beeeeg on pizza, Beeeeg on family” after all. Catering to this they had a little games room that the kids could play video games in and get some colouring pages and crayons. What’s nice is that they had a camera in there with a monitor facing the diners so you could watch your kid while having your meal.

We spent most of the evening eating separately with one of us shuttling the little guy to ride-on or taking him to the playroom or pulling him off the neighboring booths while the other could eat. He’s 2 and a half and I pray this phase passes soon so we can venture out and eat our food hot and together at the same time. I know this is par for the course for all parents so I reckon there’s many of you that will relate to this post and are smiling gleefully now that your stage of this is over.

Kudo’s to the team at Panarotti’s who were very understanding and didn’t give us dirty looks at our antics. And the next time I decide to eat out with my 2 year old, please just stick my head in the microwave and switch it on.