Jamie Oliver has long been the main ethical justification of the revolting phenomenon of the TV celebrity chef. He has used his influence purposefully in many different areas, attempting to demystify good eating and cooking for all. Now he’s put his own money where his mouth is. Without a single press release or TV tie-in, he’s launched a chain of restaurants of his own, aiming to deliver “brilliant, simple, rustic Italian food” at modest prices, in approachable settings.

So far, there’s only the one Jamie, in a street in Oxford packed with other chains. Bath and Kingston come next, with Brighton and Cambridge also on the hit-list. If anything like the price-quality ratio of Jamie’s in Oxford can be maintained, the operation looks a winner, however poor we all get.

The decor is non-snooty to the point of resembling a bus station waiting room — bright red and purple plastic chairs, simple tables, constant noise and music. The service is matey — “You guys”, we were called — but slow, and on our visit the staff were so full of esprit de corps that they spent more time relating to one another than to their customers. Heigh ho.

And then there’s the queueing policy ... you can’t book at all for fewer than eight people. “Just come along when it suits you,” they say, as if offering an added attraction, instead of a major deterrent to anybody with the wit to plan a few hours ahead.

This scam is no doubt designed to create a buzz and lock into the whole Oliver thing about “hanging loose”. As it happened, even on a Saturday lunchtime, we went straight to the bar and then didn’t have to wait too long — though queues of more than 45 minutes out on the street have been reported.

Never mind. The food was all conspicuously fresh, generously portioned, big-hearted in taste, good at any price, great value at this. The produce has all been well-sourced and then pretty basically cooked, when it needs to be cooked at all.

A Meat Antipasti Plank at £6.50 was a huge amount of food — bresaola, prosciutto, salami and mortadella, all great, accompanied by some excellent buffalo mozzarella and a strong pecorino with “amazing chilli jam” and a little minty coleslaw. Nice crispy squid — net-caught off the south coast, the website boasts — came fried in breadcrumbs, not batter, and accompanied by a “roasted red pepper mayo”.

Homemade pasta is served in two sizes, priced at £5-£6 as a starter, £8.50-£10.85 as a main. Prawn linguini, sausage pappardelle and truffle tagliatelle were all fine. The pan-fried prawns sat on fresh-tasting rocket and tomatoes; the buttery, cheesey tagliatelle had a rich aroma and genuine truffle shavings; the sausage was a fine take on the slow-cooked recipe in the first River Cafe book, using top-notch salsiccie.

The mains include steaks, lots of char-grilling (prawns, more sausage, a buffalo burger) and are again keenly priced. “Chicken cooked under a brick” was half a free-range Devonshire Red, boned, marinated and then char-grilled, served with a salsa of tomato, capers and chilli — and only £12.50.

Iced tap-water was brought unasked in a stylish metal jug. The short all-Italian wine list opens with acceptable Tetra Pak organics, an unoaked chardonnay from Puglia and a sangiovese from the Abruzzo, at £10.95 for 50cl, £19.95 a litre.
Although ultimately school of River Cafe, the flavours here are far from anonymous. There’s a definite Jamie-twist — lots of chilli, lots of herbs, a kind of enjoyable sloppiness to the textures.

This is Italian cooking carefully calculated to be both easy to enjoy and easy to produce. What works in Jamie’s books and programmes might just work equally well in delegated mass-catering.

The sooner the better, I say.