Richard McComb talks to restaurateur Carlo Distefano about his plans for Venetian-style dining in Birmingham.

The thing about chiacchiere is that you’ve got to have a nibble.

The small, sugar-topped pastries are traditionally served at carnival time in Italy and it’s bad form to be a party pooper. So I scoop up a couple to accompany my robust espresso. It would be rude to say no.

After a protein-packed fish lunch with Carlo Distefano, I haven’t, in all honesty, got much room to spare. I’ve enjoyed three plump scallops in a piquant sauce followed by a selection of fresh fish and shellfish – huge prawns, halibut, monkfish, more scallops – buffered with a plate of potato salad, spinach and light cauliflower fritters.

Before the main course arrives, I mention that I love pasta. “Would you like some? You must have some!” says Carlo.

What’s a guy to do? I shrug my shoulders, smile and he disappears into the kitchen. Ten minutes later, a bowl of tagliolini and scampi arrives at the table, all for me. It’s a new dish, not on the menu yet. It’s only a matter of time.

Now sometimes it can be a drag to eat in restaurants. You get good football matches and dull football matches. Restaurant meals are no different. But talking about food over lunch with an Italian restaurateur who isn’t threatening to cut my throat is a pretty good gig.

San Carlo in Temple Street has been in the city for 20 years and if you like it just how it is, you’d better hurry up and book a table. The restaurant isn’t going anywhere but it is poised for a top-to-toe refurbishment. Carlo reckons it’s looking a bit tired, dated. He’s right. The mirrored walls are going, as are the plants. Arrivederci, 1992.

The spur for the redevelopment is the imminent opening of Fumo, a Venetian-style tapas bar that Carlo is opening next to his restaurant. Fumo, which will offer small plates of food, allowing diners to mix and match and share, is based on San Carlo’s Cicchetti restaurant in Manchester.

Personally, I am baffled why it’s taken someone so long to launch the concept in Birmingham, as the idea of small dishes appeals to people who hate being over-faced with groaning plates of grub, just as it appeals to diners who like to try a variety of dishes and those who hanker for informality.

If the success of Cicchetti in Manchester is anything to go by, Fumo will be a hit in Birmingham, offering simplicity and freshness. Expect dishes like carpaccio of beef and fresh tuna tartare, sharing plates, lobster and mango salad, spaghettini with prawns, and pea and scallop risotto. If you just want a glass of wine or a cocktail, that’s fine, too, and judging by the artist’s impressions the interior of Fumo looks a cool place to kickback.

The whole investment in the revamped Birmingham operation will cost £2.5 million, not bad for a chap whose introduction to the trade came in his native Sicily, where he worked as a kid delivering espressos for a local cafe. When he arrived in the UK as a 17-year-old, Carlo had £12 in his back pocket.

Today, he sits (although he doesn’t really sit still for long) at the helm of an international restaurant business with nine UK venues, including the swish Signor Sassi restaurant in Kensington, which was acquired five years ago. There are three further Signor Sassi restaurants in Kuwait and Beirut and a fourth is due to open in Bangkok in May.

The company has feelers out in China, Singapore and India. During lunch, Carlo receives a text from one of his sons (he has two – Marcelo and Alessandro), who is on a scouting mission in Norway. A site in Piccadilly is also being sized up for a Cicchetti opening in September. Although Carlo worked in Manchester before coming to Birmingham (working in hairdressing, fashion and catering), it was the opening of the Temple Street restaurant that kick-started the birth of his restaurant empire. Now aged 68, and still living in south Birmingham, his drive is undiminished. He doesn’t take holidays (“I get bored and I hate flying”) and works seven-days a week. On a Sunday morning, you might find him walking in Hyde Park before returning to Signor Sassi to check on lunch service. Carlo devours politics like linguine. His father was a communist; Carlo is a Tory.

He got the idea for Fumo from Venice, where bustling restaurants do brisk business selling small, tapas-like dishes. The success of the Manchester venture persuaded him to replicate the idea in Birmingham. Carlo says: “We forecast we would take £25,000 a week in Ciccetti. We take £60,000 to £70,000.” When he’s not signing players for millions of pounds, Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini can be found at Ciccetti, although I doubt he has to queue.

“People like the style of dining,” says Carlo. “You have four or five small dishes and you all share. It’s something new and you get a mix of tastes. You order what you like, a bit of fish, a bit of meat. We make the food in our premises, the breads, the sweets. We charge a lower price than in San Carlo because the dishes are smaller. Pasta in San Carlo is £8-£9. In Ciccetti, it’s about £4.

“People go mad. I thought ‘Blimey.’ They keep going and going, ordering more dishes. We are so confident on this for Birmingham.”

Carlo insists all the dishes at the new Fumo, which will have 80 covers, will have to pass his taste test before they go on the menu. It is a policy he applies to all of his restaurants, wherever they are. He also believes profits should be reinvested in the restaurants, in order to give the business a competitive edge by offering customers better value.

He gives the example of a bottle of Chianti, which might sell for £20. Rather than increasing the price of the bottle to the customer, he will hunt out a superior, more expensive Chianti – but still keep it at £20. “If you go into a restaurant with passion, you will be successful,” says Carlo. “If you go into a restaurant to make money, you will not be successful.”

It’s a lesson aspiring chefs and restaurateurs would be wise to heed as they seek to jump on the bandwagon of Birmingham’s dining revolution.