Warning: don't go here for the food. They probably shouldn't even serve food…read more
You'll be served by a nice old lady who doesn't speak a word of English. Your food will be a combination of deli-meats on a plate with some microwaved bean-pasta and freezer-burned meatballs. I don't think they have a working stove at this restaurant. The house wine comes from a 5L box or bucket or bathtub or something, but it wasn't that offensive. Be sure to clean your plate or you will get interrogated - we snuck outside and secretly dispose of a whole meatball.
The interior is an unsolvable paradox. When you look one direction, you feel like you're transported to the handsome 1950's with the bar construction, faema espresso machine, and the interesting stone floor. But there's an element of third-world-country: the stained, hole-ridden tablecloth, the tattered sheet dividing the restaurant, a light bulb decorated by crepe paper wrapped around it. The bathrooms were described to me as something between a hole in the ground and a toilet. It's probably going to be completely empty there - except for a man watching TV behind the divider.
However, there's something strangely "romantic" about de Lina in the modern metropolis of Milan. It's a safe-place from the chaotic outside world where you and your dining partner will be forced to rough it for a couple hours. Think if you could take entertainment and inverse it... for EUR 35 for two people, what a way to spend a night.
And remember... be ready to clean your plate... by any means possible.
