The buzz around Lupino started slowly, giving it time to ripen on the vine.

Five years on, this unpretentious Italian bistro near the back end of the Melbourne Club has a lot of us sitting up and taking notice. That’s because Lupino (meaning “little wolf”) is fronted by a duo — manager Richard Lodge and chef Marco Lori — who know the real meaning of hospitality.

They welcome everyone with open arms, plonking a basket of bread and foil-wrapped butter on your table before you can say “Ciao bella”. A glass of good Italian red isn’t far behind.

Lori — always visible behind the stoves — can do rustic and refined: a swordfish carpaccio almost too pretty to eat, through to big, sticky four-cheese arancini that would stump a Sicilian.

Three pizzas are offered, all of them slender, and the crumbed veal with witlof and fiore di burrata reminds you what Italian food used to taste like before it got all tricked up.

But pasta is Lori’s trump card. So don’t leave Lupino without tasting the duck with house-made tagliolini, or the envelope-shaped agnolotti with divinely silky veal and amaretti, or a comforting brodo brimming with chicken and garlic tortelloni.

Lodge, the consummate host, will set you right with a keenly curated wine list. And if Lupino — all timber, concrete and terracotta tile — gets a bit boisterous at times, snag a stool at the kitchen bar. Over there, it’s a tad quieter and puts you right at the heart — and hearth — of things.

Must eat dish: agnolotti with veal