Rome Restaurant Recognizance

When I found round trip airfare on Delta from Savannah, Georgia to Rome for under $800 per ticket, how could mom and I not have the immediate desire to return to Rome for a second visit this year? It took about a nanno-second to click the purchase button and our dates were set. Mom and I would spend Thanksgiving in Bella Roma.

Just like our March 2012 trip to Rome, this trip in November was a very food-focused week, with a few visits to churches and an archaeological site brought to life with 21st century technology.

We departed Savannah on Wednesday, November 21st, which was the day before the (USA) Thanksgiving holiday. When I booked the flights I didn’t even think about it being the day before the holiday, heck at less than $800 per ticket I would have booked any date Delta wanted me to fly! It was only about a week before departure that it dawned on me we would be traveling on one of the most (if not the most) busy travel days of the year, but have I got a story about that!

I typically am the traveler who gets to the airport waaaaaay in advance of the stated departure time; I’m talking minimum 2 hours. With my “over-abundance of caution” philosophy and thinking there may be a lot of traffic on the way too the airport (I-95 highway) we left for the airport at 8am for our 11:30am departure. Well, I could have taxi-ed a plane down I-95 with the lack of other cars on the road and we pulled into the parking lot at the Savannah airport at 8:35am.

We decided prior to the trip, since we would only be away for 1 week and the airports would probably be crowded, we would do carry-on bags only. This has worked for us on other trips, so it’s not a stretch for us to not check our bags.

We were shocked when we entered the ticket counter area of the airport to find no lines at all, unbelievable to us. We had already checked in on-line, but because we were on an international ticket, I knew an agent had to look at our passports and stamp “Docs OK” on our boarding passes. Since we had plenty of time and there was no line at the front counters we got our passports checked there instead of at the gate.

The security line had slightly more people than the check-in counter, but we were through security in about 15 minutes and heading to our gate to “camp-out” for a few hours.

I left mom sitting at the gate while I went to get coffee. I couldn’t have been gone more than 15 minutes when I come back and she is chatting it up with Stephen the Delta gate agent. It turns out there is space on the 9:30am flight to Atlanta (where we will connect to a 4pm flight to Rome) and he was offering us 2 seats on that plane. Here’s the glitch, I’m standing there now with 2 cups of coffee, 2 rolling bags, 2 shoulder bags, a mom who doesn’t like to walk and drink/hold coffee at the same time and a line of people boarding the 9:30am flight that stretches half the concourse. Stephen then tells us, the 9:30am flight doesn’t have business class, and since we had been upgraded on the 11:30am flight we wouldn’t get the “nice” seats on the 9:30am flight. Honestly this didn’t bother me. What did concern me was that if mom and I were at the end of the boarding line with our 2 roll-aboard carry-on bags, would there be any space left for our bags? I profusely thanked Stephen but tell him we’ll wait for the 11:30am flight. Mom and I go back to our seats and sit back slurping our coffee.

Not 10 minutes go by and Stephen is back standing next to us, leaning down and quietly asking us if we’d like a “private plane” to Atlanta? WHAT??? Mom and I look at each other, then look at Stephen and he says, “Follow me”, so we do. Over to the next gate we go with Stephen.





It turns out there was a 5:30am flight schedule to go to Atlanta that was “delayed” due to maintenance; there was a minor problem with the ignition. While that was being fixed, the passengers from the 5:30am flight were placed on other flights to Atlanta that morning. Now at 10am the 5:30am plane was empty, but the crew and the plane had to get to Atlanta, it was after all, the busiest travel day of the year! Since we didn’t have checked bags, Stephen put us on this plane, we left Savannah about an hour earlier than expected at 10:30am, with only me and mom and the crew of 5 on the plane! Yes, I could have roller-skated down the aisle because there was no one else on the plane.

The crew asked us first if we had a tight connection in Atlanta and was that why we were on this plane, our reply, “No, our Rome flight doesn’t leave until 4pm”, then they asked, “Do you work for the airline?” our reply again was, “No”. We were just at the right place at the right time and only had carry-on bags. I had to take pictures of the completely empty plane because we knew no one would believe us!

We can happily say, we arrived in Atlanta with plenty of time to spare and settled into the newly renovated and very comfortable sky lounge in Terminal E to wait for our 4pm flight to Rome.

Arrival Day in Rome - Thursday, November 22nd

The flight to Rome was uneventful. We paid the extra fee to be in the comfort economy seats, which are only a slight improvement over the regular economy seats. We landed on time, and whizzed through passport control (they didn’t even stamp our passports). Since we didn’t check bags, a stop at baggage claim was unnecessary and we were meeting our Rome Cabs ( http://www.romecabs.com/ ) driver less than 30 minutes after de-planing. Rush hour traffic into the historic center of Rome was fairly heavy on this Thursday morning, but it only took about 1 hour to get from the airport to our hotel, the Albergo del Senato at Piazza della Rotonda ( http://www.albergodelsenato.it/ )

We arrived at the Albergo del Senato at about 9:15am and as we had assumed, our room was not quite ready. We left our bags and headed straight to Café Camilloni for a proper cappuccino and cornetti. I found this café, through Elizabeth Minchilli’s Eat Rome App ( http://www.elizabethminchilliinrome.com/ ), which was a huge resource for me this trip, along with Katie Parla’s Rome for Foodies App ( http://www.parlafood.com/ ). Café Camilloni is in Piazza St. Eustachio, yes, it is a neighbor to the more famous Café St. Eustachio, which I used to flock to on prior visits, but I’ve got to say, Café Camilloni made an outstanding cappuccino and the apple and cream filled cornetti was deliciously fresh. It was the perfect way to refuel ourselves. The café is definitely worth a visit, it’s a bit “old school” and kind of like stepping back in time a bit, but in a good way. If you’re in the area, do give it a try.

After our caffeine “fix” we made a couple stops, to access cash, buy a few postcard stamps and a couple books my Italian teacher asked me to pick up for her. We also made a visit to the church of Santa Maria Sopra Minera. It’s a favorite of ours and since it’s just “down the street” from our hotel it was an easy stop.

On our way to the church we could hear a lot of music. As we got closer we could see an American college (or maybe it was high school) marching band in full regalia lined up in front of the church playing a variety of snappy tunes. They were really good. Our first thought was…”Guess they didn’t make the cut for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade so came to Rome instead”, not a bad trade-off! We don’t really know why they were there, but it was a pleasant diversion.

By noon we were really dragging and fortunately by this time our room was ready so we checked in and settled into our room and promptly took a nap for a few hours. I know a lot of people don’t think this is the best way to tackle the arrival day in Europe, but we find if we can get a few hours of rest in the afternoon then get up, got to aperitivo and dinner then to bed we function pretty well.

After a few hours of “shut-eye” mom and I were ready to hit the town for aperitivo. Instead of venturing into a café, we decided to go to a cheese shop, yes, a cheese shop, but believe me this was an extraordinary cheese shop. To be fair, it really is more than a typical cheese shop, it’s also an enotecca that serves light lunches, light dinners and aperitivo.

At about 6pm we walked into Beppe e i suoi Formaggi, this translates to Beppe and His Cheeses, at Via Santa Maria del Pianto 9A/11, which was about a 10-15 minute walk from our hotel. When we walked in, the display cases presented a sea of cheeses, which are all lovingly cared for.

After ogling the vast variety of cheeses, we walked into the adjacent room and sat down at a table, we ordered a couple glasses of wine and a mixed plate of cheeses. We were presented with a beautiful plate of 5 different cheeses, some cow’s milk, some sheep’s milk, but all were delicious. Our plan to have a glass of wine each, turned into 2 glasses each and before we knew it, it was close to 7:30pm and we needed to get moving for our 8pm dinner reservation. Our aperitivo came to €33 for 4 glasses of wine and a cheese plate with 5 exceptionally delicious cheeses. As we were leaving mom commented, “I’d like to eat my way through Beppe’s cheese counter”, well, mom we better plan on moving to Rome then, because it would probably take close to a year of daily visits to try them all!

Fortunately Beppe’s cheese shop is not far from one of the stops for the #8 tram and within minutes we were boarding the tram heading in the Casaletto direction. The trattoria, Cesare al Casaletto (Via del Casaletto, 45) in the Monteverde neighborhood, although not in the centro storico, is incredibly easy to get to. If you take the #8 tram from Largo Argentina (which is the first stop [or last depending on the direction] on that tram line) and go all the way to the very last stop (Casaletto) get off the tram, walk across the tram tracks, cross the street and walk a few feet you will be at the front door of Cesare al Casaletto, it couldn’t be easier!

I read about this trattoria on both the Eat Rome and Rome for Foodies Apps, where it was highly recommended. The specialty here are the tasty fried tid-bits on the starter menu. I had heard/read so many good things about all the fritti on the menu, I wanted to try them all, but mom was the voice of reason, because she also wanted to try the highly regarded buccatini alla amatriciana, which got more praise on the Tavole Romane website (http://tavoleromane.wordpress.com/ ).

I will admit when we got off the tram, I “zigged” when I should have “zagged” and walked in the wrong direction for about 3 minutes when I realized we should have turned right when we got off the tram not left, but it was not a big blunder and a few minutes after 8pm we were walking through the door of Cesare al Casaletto.

We were greeted warmly and in my fractured Italian I managed to communicate that we had a reservation. We were seated in the bright, warm, friendly dining room and in one quick glance around the room we knew we were the only non-Italian speaking diners, we loved this place already! The restaurant was not at maximum capacity, but it seemed to us it was definitely a neighborhood place, with tables full of what appeared to be happy Italian families or friends having a good time.

Once we were settled in, one of the servers, who I believe was the owner, came over to tell us the daily specials. We established that mom and I had a limited Italian vocabulary and he was kind enough to speak very sloooooowly to us. We decided to have fried meatballs with pesto, also known as polpette di bollito con pesto di basilico, which is their signature dish and the eggplant croquettes with a spicy marinara sauce. All we could say was WOW! The meatballs were delicious, the best part was the pesto, but our favorite of the two were the eggplant croquettes. The croquettes not only had great flavor, but they were creamy smooth on the inside and perfectly crispy on the outside and the sauce had just the perfect kick to it.

We asked the owner to help us select a wine and he picked a great red for us. For main dishes, mom had the buccatini alla amatriciana which she proclaimed was excellent, which was right in line with the readers of the Tavole Romane website read poll. I had the coda alla vacinara, also known as braised ox tails and they were tender, tender, tender and the sauce was full of flavor.

Based on a perfectly timed blog article about this restaurant, by Katie Parla, the day before we arrived in Rome, I knew the panna cotta was a “not to be missed” dessert here, so I ordered one with frutti di bosco (mixed fruits/berries), it was silky smooth. As usual, mom and I finished the meal with espresso.

Mom and I really enjoyed this place and it was a perfect way to start our week in Rome. The service was friendly and they were interested in knowing how we found out about them. When the bill arrived at our table we were in for a happy surprise, the total cost of the meal was €60.

We left the trattoria two very happy ladies, boarded the awaiting tram and took it to the last stop, Largo Argentina and walked back to the hotel. Of course our first night in Rome wouldn’t be complete without a stop at the bar next to the hotel for a limoncello. All seemed right on this Thanksgiving night, even though a turkey wasn’t in our sights!

Friday, November 23rd

This day was dedicated to the Monti neighborhood, an area we started to get more familiar with on our last trip to Rome and we found that we really like it.

After a quick, but satisfying breakfast at the hotel mom and I set off to the bus stop on Via del Corso, which was around the corner and down the street from the hotel. We hopped on the #117 electric bus and headed straight for Via dei Serpenti because we had olive oil on our minds.

Back in March after doing an olive oil workshop with Elizabeth Minchilli we were told about a terrific shop in the Monti neighborhood called Podere Vecciano (Via dei Serpenti, 33). This is their website: www.poderevecciano.com . It’s a lovely shop filled with Tuscan specialties, including terrific olive oils and beautiful olive wood pieces (cutting boards, bowls, spoons, etc). They also have a nice variety of olive oil holders/containers in what looked to be stainless steel at very good prices.

My main reason for stopping here was to buy some more of their olive oil, this time I was smart and bought a 1 liter tin, so I won’t be longing for more after I go through a half liter bottle . But I also wanted to “drool” over their gorgeous olive wood cutting boards. This time I succumbed and purchased a rather large and exquisite cutting board, which I am still refraining from using in my kitchen just yet, it’s seems too pretty to cut on, but I’m sure I’ll get over that feeling soon!

As the noon hour approached we made our way to a wine tasting lunch with VinoRoma ( www.vinoroma.com ), which was also in the Monti neighborhood a short walk from Via dei Serpenti. This was our third tasting with VinoRoma. Some may think why keep going back, well, there are 3 different types of tastings VinoRoma conducts and since we had been to the other two, doing the lunch tasting made perfect sense to us. Also, Hande, the sommelier who is VinoRoma, is an absolutely terrific person. I happen to follow her on Twitter and from the wine education I have received at her VinoRoma tastings and by following her on Twitter I have really expanded my knowledge about wines, don’t get me wrong, I still have a lot to learn about wines, but Hande makes it so much fun.

There were 4 wines in the tasting. We started with one of my favorite types of Italian wine, a Franciacorta, this is a sparkling white Italian wine, but it is not prosecco, IMHO, it outshines prosecco by miles and this particular one, Barone Pizzini Franciacorte Nature was extraordinary (a real winner in my book). It was crisp and effervescent and it makes a perfect wine for aperitivo and if you can accompany it with a good fritti starter you will certainly have a happy palate.

We continued the tasting with a white wine from the Campania region, it was a Greco di Tufo DOP, and this was another winner, but then again, I’m partial to white wines. The third wine was a red from Lazio, the region Rome is located in, and although it was good, I rated the whites we tasted higher. Our last wine was a sweet wine, it was Recioto dell Valpolicella, and even though I’m not a huge sweet wine drinker, this wine had something to it, and believe it or not, it went remarkably well when paired with blue cheese and also chocolate (although not the cheese and chocolate together!). The taste of this sweet wine when sampled on its own was that of raisins. So you can see, there was a nice variety of a wine to taste from different regions of Italy.

Here is what I had to say about VinoRoma in my Trip Advisor review:

I recently attended my third VinoRoma wine tasting and as much as I loved the first two, this third one was my favorite! Maybe it was because it was the wine tasting lunch so there was salumi and cheese involved!

The greatest thing (in my opinion) about VinoRoma is that no matter how much or how little you know about wines you will come out of the experience learning something new and it is always fun. VinoRoma is so approachable in her wine education techniques; she will draw out things you don't even realize at first. I've taken the knowledge I've acquired from VinoRoma and really started to use it at home when I'm either out to dinner ordering wines, or shopping in my local wine shop.

This particular wine tasting with lunch was especially interesting because it really showed how pairing certain wines with certain foods can "make or break" the taste of both the wine and the food. A VinoRoma experience has really opened my eyes to the big-wide-world of wines and I have to give a huge Thank You to Hande for that!

If you are hesitant about booking a tasting because you are a wine beginner, just do it. I had been drinking wines for about 3 years when I did my first VinoRoma tasting in 2010 and now I can say with some pride that I have a nice little base of wine knowledge thanks to VinoRoma!

After the wine tasting we did a little more shopping. As I’ve confused in other trip reports I have, what some may call an obsession with handbags, so a visit to a shop selling Gabs Bags (http://www.gabs.it/en/ ) was definitely on my itinerary. Once our “retail therapy session” was over, we decided since we were now near Piazza del Popollo and the weather was lovely we would grab a seat at an outdoor café and wile away an hour sipping a cappuccino freddo, it was the perfect afternoon.

We made our way back to our hotel in the late afternoon, rested for a while and by 6pm we were ready to try a new place for aperitivo. This time we would give Enoteca Cavour 313 on Via Cavour a try since it was just around the corner from where we had dinner reservations.

After leaving the hotel we hopped on a bus and skirted around Piazza Venezia (a place mom refers to as “the piazza from hell”, due to the difficulty trying to navigate our way by foot around, or through this traffic clogged piazza). It really was just about a 10 minute bus ride, but once we stepped off the bus, it was an easy walk to Cavour 313, located at (you guessed it, Via Cavour 313). Their website is: www.cavour313.it

As we walked in, we were greeted with a pleasant “Buona Sera” and I asked if we could sit down for aperitivo. We were pointed towards the back of the enoteca and as we walked towards the tables we definitely got a rustic vibe. There were shelves of wine bottles everywhere and the tables were of the “chunky wood” type. The staff was friendly and again, indulged me with my attempts at ordering in Italian. We had a nice white wine from the same winery as one of the wines we tasted with VinoRoma. We ordered a plate of cheese to go with the wine, but not being “up” on all the Italian cheeses there are, we just pointed at one on the menu. We were served a plate with a very creamy (spreadable) cheese and an accompanying herby/creamy spread. We had no idea what it was, but it tasted pretty good…ordering can sometimes be an adventure with us! The cost for 4 glasses of wine and the cheese was €27.

Just before 8:30pm we settled the bill at Cavour 313 and walked around the corner to Taverna dei Fori Imperiali located at Via della Madonna dei Monti, 9. Their website is: www.latavernadeiforiimperiali.com

This restaurant was a recommendation from the Eat Rome App and it was a very pleasant experience. I’m glad we had a reservation because the place was packed and lively when we arrived and we watched as diners without reservations were advised to come back later in the evening. The staff was friendly and it’s clearly a family run place, with lots of typical Roman dishes. Yes, this is a place with red-checked tablecloths and lots of other tourists, but don’t let that put you off, the food and service was terrific.

The daughter of the owner was our server and her English was excellent. We knew that punterelle was in season and it’s a favorite dish for me and mom, so when we didn’t see it on the menu, we asked about it and I’m glad we did. It was one of the best versions of the dish we’ve ever had, the perfect blend of fresh punterelle, olive oil and anchovy dressing. For our main dishes, mom and I ordered the same thing, the veal saltimbocca, which is a house specialty and it was very good, not “out of this world delicious” but it was a good, solid, Roman dish. Since there was eggplant capponata on the menu and it came highly recommended to us (via the Eat Rome App) and mom and I never met an eggplant dish we didn’t like we had a side order of it. The capponata had a terrific sweet and sour flavor, it was delicious. We asked our server for help selecting a wine and she recommended a local (Lazio) red wine that went perfectly with the meal. We ended with our “signature” espresso followed by limoncello. All this for the grand total of €61.50.

We left the restaurant happy and ready for a good night’s sleep, because the next day we would be on a mission to find a teeny-tiny spice shop in the midst of several demonstrations and re-routed bus lines.

Saturday, November 24th

We were on a mission to find oregano today! Hande from VinoRoma gave us a recommendation for a spice shop in the Testaccio neighborhood and mom and I were up for the challenge of finding this tiny shop. I say challenge because before leaving the VinoRoma wine tasting Hande mentioned there would be some demonstrations on Saturday and bus routes might be altered.

Using the ATAC route planner I found there was a bus we could take, without having to transfer, which would get us within walking distance of Emporio delle Spezie, located at Via Luca della Robbia, 20 ( www.emporiodellespezie.com ).

In the late morning we hopped on the #30 bus, which on a non-demonstration day, would have taken us to Via Mamorata, which is just a short walk to the shop. The bus was not very crowded and I kept an eye on the direction we were heading and the stops the bus was making. When we made what seemed to me to be a diversion I turned my attention to the front of the bus where another passenger was having a conversation with the bus driver. I heard the words “Via Mamorata” and started to pay more attention. When the passenger who was speaking with the driver got off at the next stop, I took that as a cue and mom and I got off too. Now in an area I wasn’t expecting to be in, I pulled out my phone with the handy Eat Rome App, which also listed the spice shop and used the App’s GPS function to guide us to Via Marmorata and ultimately the shop. It was about a 20 minute walk for us, but as soon as we were 3 doors away from Emporio delle Spezie, our noses told us we were in the right spot. The fragrance emanating from the shop was intoxicating.

The shop was tiny, barely 4 women and a stroller could fit inside, but there was quite a selection of spices to choose from, there were shelves from floor to ceiling filled with glass canisters of spice as well as other interesting ingredients. The prices here were terrific, much lower than the spice vendors in the Campo dei Fiori market. The women working was as nice as could be and after getting Sicilian oregano and some curry powder mom and I were off walking in the direction of the new Testaccio market.

The new Testaccio market replaced the old Testaccio market several months ago. We had the good fortune to have visited the older market several years ago. The new market is pretty “spiffy” clean and very bright. We didn’t buy anything at the market, for us; just walking around looking at all the items on offer is half the fun. And besides, we weren’t staying in an apartment, so how realistic would it really be to buy all the beautiful food products we saw!

After a spin around the market, we walked over to Volpetti, one of the most famous food shops in Rome. This was a second visit to this shop for us and we knew there was not a lot of room inside. As we arrived at the front door, a foodie tour group of about 12 people had just walked in. We knew it was going to be tight inside, but we ventured inside anyway and took a quick look around but found nothing we absolutely had to have, so back out we went.

By this point, my bus plan was quickly falling apart because many of the bus lines were re-routed, so the bus lines I wanted weren’t stopping or in some cases, weren’t running due to the demonstrations. We waited for close to an hour for a bus to come and we got on the first one that would take us towards Trastevere where we could then board the #8 Tram.

When we got to the tram stop we found out the tram was not running to the last 6 (or so) stops and we needed to get to the last stop. We got back on another bus, backtracked on Via Marmorata heading in the direction of Termini station. When the bus got into the Monti neighborhood we got off there and got on the #117 electric bus in hopes that it would take us toward our hotel, which it ultimately did, but not before we got off in the area of the Spanish Steps to look for a pasta shop that we found to have gone out of business (Drat! This day was not the poster child for a smooth plan, but that’s half the fun of traveling!)

By this time we needed a cappuccino! So we plopped down at the first café we found, had a coffee and rested our tired legs. By 4pm we were back at the hotel. What should have probably taken a couple hours ended up being a 5 hour excursion. We weren’t laughing about it while it was happening, but we are now!

Our dinner reservation was at 8:30pm at a repeat restaurant for us, Vino e Camino at Piazza dell’Oro, 6. Here is their website: http://www.vinoecamino.it/ . But of course we had to stop for aperitivo before dinner, which was at Café Farnese, not far from Campo dei Fiori, which is an old stand-by for us. We had a couple glasses of wine and a few nibbles here before walking to Vino e Camino.

The driving force for having a repeat dinner here was because of the delicious Sardinian tomato bread starter. We enjoyed this dish on our March trip to Rome and had such good memories we wanted to try it again. One word of advice when dining here, the starter portions are extremely generous, so if there are 2 people dining, one starter to share is plenty. Trust me on this, we learned the “hard way” last time and each ordered a starter plus main dishes, and we were busting at the seams we were so full. So, this time, we were a bit wiser and just split the tomato bread between us.

Mom and I both had the special of the night, a veal “shin” (as the cute as a button server described it to us) with roasted potatoes. The veal was perfectly cooked, it was fall off the bone tender, we didn’t even need a knife to cut it. As on previous nights, we asked the server for help with recommending a wine that would go well with our meal and he selected a terrific pinot noir for us. We refrained from dessert but did have cups of excellent espresso. The total cost of the meal was €81

I think we surprised the owner when at the end of the meal he asked us if we needed him to call us a taxi and we told him, no thank you, we’ll take the autobus, which had a stop right across the street from the restaurant.

When we arrived back at the hotel, we stopped in the hotel bar for a limoncello to end our transit adventure day.

Sunday, November 25th

It was a terrific weather day, it was sunny and cool and it was the perfect day to explore Eataly Roma (http://www.roma.eataly.it/ ). Eataly is a “shrine” to all things Italian food and it is huge, it makes the NYC Eataly look like a tiny grocery store in comparison. The store is 4 floors, has several restaurants (I’d estimate at least 8), a cooking school, and all kinds of food products from all over Italy. There were sections devoted to cheese, including fresh mozzarella, salumi/prosciutto, fish, coffee, chocolate, baked products, wines and liquors, and that’s just a few of the items on offer.


Getting to Eataly was pretty easy. We did have to change buses once to get to the stop closest to Eataly. The bus stop was located just a few steps from the store’s front door. When we walked inside it was like walking into the Italian food version of Disney Land! It was light, bright and buzzing with people. Being a Sunday it was fairly crowded inside, not just with shoppers, but with lots of people and families eating in all the restaurants. This was a food lover’s paradise. We meandered about for close to 2 hours ogling, and salivating over everything on the shelves and we purchased several things that are hard for us to find at home.

After our “grocery store” excursion, we had a fairly low-key afternoon, relaxing at the hotel and taking a spin around the Christmas market set up in Piazza Navona.

Dinner was at another great trattoria in the Monteverde neighborhood, so it was back on the #8 Tram for us. Our reservation was for 8:30pm at L’Osteria di Monteverde at Via Pietro Cartoni, 163/165. Here is the website: http://www.losteriadimonteverde.it/ 

I read about this trattoria in a blog post from Elizabeth Minchilli and when she posted a photo of the tiramisu that is served here, I knew we had to go and we were beyond pleased with this place. In fact, we rated the meal here in the #2 spot of the whole trip just after the incredible lunch we had at Metamorfosi (but you will have to wait until my account of our Tuesday adventures to here about that lunch!).

We took the tram to the San Camillo stop and walked to the restaurant. It was about a 5 minute walk, but it is in a very residential area, in fact, as we turned down the street that lead us away from the tram stop, mom asked, “Are we going in the right direction?”, although she may have used slightly more “colorful” terminology. I pulled out my phone and accessed the Eat Rome App GPS, and yes, in fact we were going in the right direction. If you venture to this place, don’t be deterred from the apartment buildings lining the streets, it is completely worth the effort to seek this place out! We knew we had the right place when from a few yards away we saw three young men in chef coats standing outside the front doors; they greeted us warmly with a “Buona Sera”.

The interior of the trattoria gives a homey, familiar vibe, kind of like you have just walked into your own favorite neighborhood go-to “joint” back at home. Even at 8:30pm on a Sunday night, we were the first diners in the place, but within 30 minutes it filled up quite nicely, not completely full, but more than half the tables were occupied.

Even before tasting the food we knew we would like it. We were served an amuse bouche of 2 perfectly formed arancini, oh wow, where these rice balls terrific, crunchy on the outside and creamy on the inside. We had the server recommend a red wine for us and she chose an excellent Lazio red, which went perfectly with our meal.

We had heard very good things about the cacio e pepe spaghetti and we both had that as our first course. This was one of the best pasta dishes I have ever had; it was a perfect balance of cheese and pepper. When it came to the second course, mom and I decided to get the same thing, which is not always the norm since we like to try different things so we can each get a taste of another menu item, but the entrecote, steak fillet, just seemed to be calling both our names. This was the most beautiful piece of meat I have ever seen and it was cooked perfectly and with the accompanying caramelized onions and mustard it was absolutely delicious. I know, this was a lot of food, but it was so good, I still dream about this meal.

Now, faced with the dilemma of ordering the tiramisu or not…how could I not, we ordered one to share. The presentation is adorable, served in a mason jar, this was the creamiest, most flavorful version of tiramisu I have ever had. Even mom, who is not typically a dessert lover, had more spoonfuls than she is willing to admit.

As usual, we had 2 espresso and we asked if they had limoncello. I knew this might be a long shot and it was, however the server brought us what she called, “like limoncello, but orange”. Well, mom and I have found a new favorite digestivo; it’s called Mandarino (produced by Varnelli). It definitely has an orange flavor, but it also is herbaceous, which really complimented each other. All of this for the total cost of €75.

After all this food, (honestly, we hadn’t eaten since breakfast) we rolled out of the restaurant to the tram and into the hotel in less than 30 minutes.

Monday, November 26th

This was a day we were really looking forward to, we were meeting Elizabeth Minchilli ( http://www.elizabethminchilliinrome.com/ ) to do the “Insider’s Food Tour of Campo dei Fiori. We’ve been in this area of Rome a lot over the last 5 years, but many of the places Elizabeth took us to we had never seen.

We had absolutely the perfect weather for a walking food tour, it was sunny and clear and just a little cool, but not cold at all. It was like the type of day you see in a picture postcard.

We were to meet Elizabeth at 10:30am and we were slightly delayed leaving our hotel because many of the other guests were checking out and the little elevator could only hold so many people and luggage. I walked down to the lobby from the third floor, but mom persevered waiting for the elevator. Once we left the hotel we “high-tailed” it to Campo dei Fiori and there was Elizabeth waiting for us, we were only a couple minutes late.

We started with a cappuccino in a truly “old school” coffee shop chatting with Elizabeth about, what else? Rome and food! Once we were properly caffeinated we were off to poke around all the vendors in the market. Elizabeth pointed out all the different varieties of fruits and vegetables on display and giving us a history of the market and the area.

Once we had the history of the area in place, we then started on our “gathering mission”. The next stop was at Al Forno for fresh pizza bianca, then down the street for fresh cheese. We had 4 types of cheeses, cow mozzarella, buffalo mozzarella, buffalo ricotta and buratta. With our pizza bianca and cheeses in hand, we walked around the corner to a local bar where we could sit and sample the scrumptious morsels we had just gathered along with 3 different types of aperitivo drinks (I have a new love for the Aperol Spritz!). The pizza bianca was still warm and tasty, but the cheeses were out of this world good. They were creamy and delicious, but the buffalo ricotta was luscious and the buratta was a very close second. Who ever thought of wrapping cheese inside of cheese was a genius! If you have never had buratta, or don’t know what it is check out this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burrata

Now our appetites were really getting stimulated and we are wondering what’s next? Well, now that we had cheese, how could we not have salumi? We walked back to Campo dei Fiori and into Antica Norcineria Viola (at Piazza Campo dei Fiori, 43). As we step inside mom and I look at each other and say, “How could we have passed this place all those times and never come in?”. From the ceiling hung every conceivable type of tasty pig product. We were in love with this place. The shop owner prepared a sample tray of what had to be at least 8 different types of salumi. There was such variety, some had fennel flavor, some were flavored with Barolo wine, and the prosciutto was silky smooth. We were having an incredible taste test! And of course there was red wine to wash it all down.

Before we knew it, we were off to another bakery, Roscioli, for more pizza bianca, which we have to admit we liked even better than the pizza bianca at Al Forno. With our pizza in hand (well, really it was in a bag in our hands) we walked about a block to the enoteca called Il Vinaietto located at Via del Monte della Farina, 38. This place definitely has some character, or maybe characters is a better word. What other wine bar could we walk into were a shepard comes to drop off farm made cheese to our tour guide!

The great thing about this place is you can bring in your pizza bianca, order a glass of wine and sit down for a nice little lunch break. The shop is packed floor to ceiling with wine; you can buy a bottle or two or stop to enjoy a glass of wine or two. The owner was a terrifically friendly lady and when she saw we had pizza bianca she recommended a great Lambrusco wine from the Emilia Romagna region. We hadn’t had Lambrusco that good since our 2010 trip to Bologna!

As if all this food wasn’t enough, we still had not had lunch! We left Il Vinaietto and walked to the Jewish Ghetto to a trattoria called Sora Margherita at 30 Piazza delle Cinque Scole. When I describe this place as a “hole in the wall” I am not joking, it’s tiny and every table was full of happy diners (always a good sign!). We enjoyed more Roman specialties here included fried artichokes, a bitter green vegetable side dish, I can’t remember the name of, but mom loved, fried zucchini, which was my favorite and then the most unique version of cacio e pepe I’ve ever had. The cacio e pepe here is served with a dollop of ricotta cheese on top, it was very good but we were getting to our bursting point by now.

As we left Sora Margherita, we are thinking, “BASTA” (“ENOUGH”) but oh, no, gelato was the final stop of the day. We walked to Alberto Pica another “old school” type of shop, but the gelato here is pure heaven. This shop was a place in the neighborhood where residents went to get their milk and since they had milk there, they began making gelato. We tasted four flavors, which were pistachio, zabaglione, pear and rice. They were all wonderfully creamy and the pear (honest to goodness) tasted like we were eating a real pear (gotta love that!), but the rice gelato, oh, wow, the rice. It tasted like the best rice pudding you ever had.

The gelato stop was the perfect way to end an excellent food tour. We had a great time with Elizabeth, she is so friendly and easy-going, and at the end of the tour it was like saying good-bye to a long-time friend.

By the time we got back to the hotel it was just after 3pm and we were ready to pop, but this did not deter us. We took a rest for a while and then around 6:30pm went to the wine bar next to the hotel for aperitivo.

Believe it or not, we did actually have dinner reservations! Since we enjoyed our meal so much at Cesare al Casaletto on our arrival day, a few days later we made another reservation for this night, so off we went back on the #8 tram.

We had an incredibly warm greeting when we walked in the door and tonight there seemed to be even more families with children and tables filled with groups of older men and young couples.

Mom started with the pasta e fagioli soup, it was a huge portion and steaming hot. I had the buccatini alla carbonara and it was absolutely delicious, I was licking my lips. We probably should have stopped there, but we didn’t.

For our main dishes we heard really good things about the lamb chops here, so I ordered them fried and mom ordered them grilled. But there was a mix-up and mom ended up with the bacala special, which was actually better than my fried lamb chops, but when you’re expecting grilled lamb chops and get fish, it’s a bit disconcerting.

We rolled with the punches, I asked mom if she wanted me to call the server over and she declined, good thing she likes fish. My fried lamb chops looked great on the plate and although they were fried they were not greasy at all, they just didn’t have much flavor (at least not to me), they just tasted like fried meat. We did have a side order of perfectly grilled vegetables and a terrific red wine. The owner came to take our plates away and when he saw the mistake of the fish versus the grilled lamb chops he apologized profusely and offered to bring us a plate of the grilled the lamb chops, but we had such a food-filled day we politely declined his offer. After a couple espresso we paid the bill, which was €75 and toddled off to the tram laughing about the experience…yes, I really need to get more proficient in my Italian!

Tuesday, November 27th

Even though there were clouds in the sky and intermittent rain sprinkles today was a day that will go down in our food memories for the rest of our lives. Today was the day we had a lunch reservation at Metamorfosi. Here is their website: http://metamorfosiroma.it/

I had read a lot about Metamorfosi on Katie Parla’s and Elizabeth Minchilli’s blogs. And on more than one occasion VinoRoma had spoken to me about having a meal here. They all gave this restaurant rave reviews. Just a few weeks prior to this trip the restaurant received its first (well deserved) Michelin star.

Mom was hesitant about booking a reservation here because of a previous (less than stellar) experience we had at another Michelin starred place in Paris. However, I was very keen on having a meal here. I knew VinoRoma (and Katie and Elizabeth) would not steer us wrong. In fact, along with following VinoRoma, Katie & Elizabeth on Twitter, I also began following the sous chef from Metamorfosi on Twitter and I was getting a feel for not only the type of food that was being produced at Metamorfosi, but also I was getting a feel for the kind of atmosphere we might find there.

About a week before our departure I visited the Metamorfosi website and noted they were also open for lunch. So, I posed the question to mom, “If you don’t want to have dinner there, what about lunch?” She knew I really wanted to try this place and she agreed to lunch. I quickly emailed the concierge at our hotel in Rome and asked if she would be kind enough to make one more restaurant reservation for me and she happily did so.

Not knowing exactly how long it would take us using the buses to get to Metamorfosi (located at Via Giovanni Antonelli, 30) in the Parioli neighborhood, we left the hotel just after 11:30am for a 1pm lunch reservation. The first bus we needed arrived at the bus stop pretty quickly and off we went. After about 6 stops, we got off and waited for the second bus. We had maybe a 10 minute wait for the second bus and hopped on it, just in time to get out of the rain that was starting. This second bus we had to ride for about 8 stops, but I was not at all familiar with this area, so I had to really pay attention. If no one on the bus requested a stop and no one was at the bus stop waiting the bus didn’t stop, so I had to keep an eye out the window looking at the bus stop signs not only to keep count, but to try and read the name of each stop.

Fortunately I had the foresight prior to the trip to not only check out the street address of the restaurant on Google Maps, but I also accessed Google Street View so that I knew what the street looked like and I also was able to see where the bus stop was on the street nearest the restaurant…yes, I am slightly anal retentive!

As we stepped off the bus at the correct stop, I looked at my watch and we were almost an hour early. Luckily there was a little kitchen store on the same street, so we killed about 20 minutes looking in the shop. At just around 12:30pm we walked to the restaurant’s front door.

As we approached the door there was a gentleman outside sweeping. I said hello and he greeted us. I said we had a lunch reservation, but were early and since there was no one else in the restaurant would it be ok, if we just waited outside. He smiled at us and said, “No, please come inside and wait.” We had every intention of waiting in the little vestibule area, but he seated us, and brought us some bottled water, I apologized for being so early, but it didn’t seem to bother him.

We sat down and settled in. Earlier in the morning I had tweeted to John, the sous chef, that we were looking forward to having lunch there and within minutes of us sitting down, he was at our table greeting us. He was extremely nice, welcoming us in, asking how we were. I again apologized for arriving well before our 1pm reservation, and said by using the buses; I wasn’t sure how long it would take us to get there. He completely understood. He mentioned that since the restaurant was in a rather residential area lunches tend to be “quiet”. Boy, he wasn’t kidding, we were the only ones in the restaurant for the entire 2 hours we were there.

The gentleman, who originally greeted us at the door, was actually the restaurant’s sommelier! He was absolutely terrific, explaining to us, in near perfect English, that his English was not very good. Ahhhh, if only I was as competent in my Italian as he was with English I would communicate much better in Italy! He started us off with glasses of the most divine French champagne we have ever had. I was remiss and didn’t get the name, or even a picture of the bottle for future reference, but for this girl who loves her bubbly it was exceptional.

The first “treat” brought to the table was the best bread I have ever had, seriously! This was spelt bread with olive oil cream, the presentation alone made me want to swoon, but when we took a bite of the bread with the cream slathered on it, we were in heaven. I will admit, I never met a carbohydrate I didn’t like, but the bread here is something out of this world. It is all made in house, by hand and John the sous chef is a master with bread. This spelt bread was merely the first of two bread “courses”. The second bread “basket” arrived with 3 different types of bread, all were crispy and tender at the same time. The basket included a classic baguette, a chestnut roll, which had a distinct and delicious flavor and lastly, what I would call a rolled bread with capers, which was the big hit for both mom and me. In order to not stuff ourselves silly with bread, but wanting to try them all, we split one of each between the two of us.

We decided to have the tasting menu called, Not Fish Not Meat, which was €60. The sommelier helped us select a wine to go with our meal. He gave us 3 recommendations to choose from and we went with a bottle of Italian sauvignon blanc.

The amuse bouche was a puree of potato with anchovies and fennel fronds. It tasted like liquid, silky smooth mashed potatoes. The first course was their version of spinach and mozzarella. This was an absolute work of art! There was a piece of olive bread topped with chopped tomatoes then a round piece of mozzarella which was then topped with a sheet of mozzarella and the finishing touch was when the server sprinkled frozen, crystallized spinach power on top. Wow! What a dish, it not only tasted great, it looked fantastic!

The next course was papparadelle with porcini mushrooms and smoked cheese. This was another knock-out dish; it was smoky and earthy and tasted like comfort food in a bowl. The vegetable course was a stuffed eggplant with mozzarella and red pepper cream. It looked so pretty on the plate and it was light and refreshing.

The dessert course was an apple and rhubarb cake with cardamom ice cream. It was the perfect finish, light and delicious and full of flavor. We ended the meal with 2 excellent espresso, and of course the post-dessert dessert plate of petit fours. This was an absolutely incredibly delicious meal and the service was excellent. As we were finishing our meal, mom looked me dead in the eyes from across the table and said, “This is the best meal I have ever had”. I have to admit, I was doing a little happy dance inside. It will not be difficult to “twist our arms” to go back to Metamorfosi on any future trip to Rome. The total cost of this meal was €160 the tasting menu was €60 per person and the wine was about €40.

We left the restaurant just before 3pm and I managed to get us back to the hotel via a variety of buses. We had several quiet, restful hours back at the hotel and by 6:30pm we were ready for aperitivo. It was rather drizzly outside so we wanted to find a place we could have a couple glasses of wine inside. Osteria dell’Ingegno located on Piazza della Pietra was just the place for us. We had found this place in March when we were looking for a light lunch, they have great salads here. The front area of the restaurant has smaller tables and a little bar area and they have a pretty diverse list of wines by the glass. And we gave the place bonus points for being just around the corner from our hotel.

When we went inside there were a couple tables already occupied and one of the things I noticed here was that although there were a few men, most of the other customers were groups of women doing exactly what mom and I were doing, having a glass of wine and chatting with each other. I found it interesting that for the location of this place, on a well-trodden tourist path between the Pantheon and Trevi Fountain, mom and I were the only English speakers inside. I was surprised but happy to see not one but two kinds of Franciacorta sparkling wines on the by-the-glass wine list. Although it was tempting to order the bubbly, we decided to go with a local frascati wine and at €5 per glass, we didn’t say no. In fact, most all of the by-the-glass wines were very reasonably priced.

After about an hour, it was time for us to hop on another bus and head towards the Monti neighborhood. This time our dinner destination was Trattoria Monti at Via San Vito, 15A. I have to give a “shout-out” thank you to Fodorite ekscrunchy because years ago, when I began doing Rome restaurant research (before I started following all these Rome bloggers!) she recommended this trattoria and it had been on my “go to” list for quite some time. I am very happy I finally got there!

We had an 8:30pm reservation and I am glad we did. By 9pm every table was full and they were turning people away and this was a Tuesday night! This place is definitely on the tourist radar. The food here is from the Marche region and the brothers that run this trattoria are just adorable and very kind. We were greeted warmly when we arrived and shown to a table. They presented us with English menus, but I asked for one in Italian too (like I always do, just so I can practice my language skills), I think this threw them for a bit of a loop, but they provided me with one.

I had heard so many enthusiastic recommendations for the red onion flan with gorgonzola sauce that is served here, that mom and both ordered one to start and we were not disappointed. In fact, we joked at the end of the meal that we were going to order 2 more portions of the red onion flan for our dessert! For our main dishes we both had the roasted pork with potatoes, which was recommended by our server. It was deliciously flavorful and tender. We also had a side dish of grilled radicchio, which was good, mom loved it, but it was a bit bitter for my liking. Our server recommended an excellent red wine from the Marche region to go with our meal and it was spot-on. We finished another excellent meal with 2 espresso, for a grand total of €89.

Wednesday, November 28th


This was our last full day in Rome, and the first one with heavy rain, and thunder and lighting, but we would make the best of it, every day can’t be “picture postcard perfect”! We had a leisurely morning and the only 2 things on the day’s agenda was a tour of the Palazzo Valentini and dinner at L’Asino D’Oro.

I purchased the tickets to the Palazzo Valentini tour on-line before leaving home. Here is the website: http://www.palazzovalentini.it/scavi.php?lang=eng . Under this palazzo were archaeological remains of ancient Roman houses and it was thanks to a mention on Fodor’s that I found out about this great experience.

When I completed the on-line ticket purchase the instructions told us to arrive at the venue about one hour before the stated 1:30pm tour starting time. At about 12:30pm we hopped on the #117 electric bus and just a few stops later we were stepping off the bus right in front of the Palazzo Valentini. We showed the guard at the front entrance our email confirmation and he pointed us through the courtyard where we found the office for the tour clearly marked. We picked up our tickets and were told to be back in the courtyard 5 minutes before the tour was scheduled to start at 1:30pm.

Lucky for us, there was a bar across the street, and we went inside for a couple cups of hot chocolate. They were delicious, just the way we like our Italian hot chocolate, “atomic” hot, chocolaty and thick, thick, thick! YUM! After occupying ourselves with hot chocolate for about 40 minutes we walked back over to the tour starting point and waited for the tour begin.

There were about 15 people in the tour, and we descended a set of stairs, turned a corner and were presented with another set of about 8 steps that were clear, we could see right down to the ground, this was a bit disorienting at first, especially walking down steps.

Once down into the open area, we looked down and the whole floor was completely “see-through”, not sure if it was glass or some kind of plastic, but we could see the excavations clearly. Now comes the “multi-media” part. All the lights were turned off and they remained off for much of the tour, the floors are flat when we moved from room to room and when there were a few steps there was adequate lighting to see them. On the walls were projections of what the buildings we were standing over would have looked like in ancient times. Then there were parts of the presentation where we looked down and different lights were illuminating different areas that were excavated.

The one presentation that really made me say “Wow” was when we were ushered into a room and as we looked down from above we could see a floor that had some mosaic tiles still intact. Then through lighting and projection the areas of the floor that were dirt, where filled in to look as it did when the home was in use. It was really an incredible presentation.

I will say, if you don’t like dark places, and/or have difficulty walking this may not be the tour for you. Mom and I both thought it was an excellent tour and the way the history of the houses we were standing over unfolded in front of us was terrific. We’ve been to Pompeii and other ancient sites, but at this location by using the multi-media presentation with video, lighting and sound, we really felt like we were inside the ancient homes and it was much easier to visualize/imagine what life may have been like living in that time.

The tour lasted about one hour and when we finished the heavy rain had stopped but it was still drizzling. We hadn’t made it over to the Trevi Fountain all week, so we decided this would be the perfect time to go and toss our coins in the fountain. Surprisingly it wasn’t too crowded and we tossed our euros in to ensure a future return to Rome.

On our way to the Trevi fountain we passed a restaurant/bar called Baccano (at Via delle Muratte, 23). As soon as I saw the sign and windows I knew I had read about this place in one of Elizabeth Minchilli’s blog posts. She had been there and mentioned they had pretty good cocktails there. Mom and I liked the looks from the outside, so we went in. Here is their website: http://www.baccanoroma.com/it/home

When we walked in, we noticed one side of the restaurant was clearly for dining, but there was a nice bar area too and that was not crowded at all (well, it was 3pm, not necessarily prime bar time). We walked over to the bar area and had a seat in one of the booths. I went to the bar and ordered our drinks. I approached the bar friendly bartenders and ordered a pinot grigio for mom and an Aperol Spritz for me. Heck, we were starting aperitivo early, but we had to go back to the hotel and start packing our bags soon, so we needed a little encouragement. My spritz had such a pretty garnish, and tasted great, much better than my attempts at home to create an Aperol Spritz! We really liked this place and have made a note of it for another trip to dedicate a “true” aperitivo visit here.

At about 4pm we toddled back to our hotel to get the return home packing “mission” underway. Between a cutting board, hand bags, and food products we purchased it was a tight squeeze back into our suitcases, but we made it without having to buy another suitcase (yes, we’ve had to do that on other previous trips!) or without having our bags weigh more than allowed by Delta Airlines.

At about 6pm we were ready for our second aperitivo of the day and went back around the corner to Osteria dell’Ingegno where we had been the night before and had a couple glasses of wine before heading to the Monti neighborhood for our 8pm dinner reservation at L’Asino D’Oro. The restaurant is located at Via Boschetto, 73 and here is their website: http://www.lasinodororoma.it/

We had been to L’Asino D’Oro on a previous trip to Rome and it quickly became one of our favorite places. So, we thought it would be a great way to end our week in Rome and it was. We had a bottle of red wine from the Lazio region. Mom started with a black chickpea, pepper and chestnut soup and proclaimed it was wonderful; she loves the soups the chef here makes. She says each of the soups she has eaten here has been exceptional, and has a depth of flavor not always found in other restaurant soups. I had the lamb ragu gnocchi, I know it wasn’t Thursday (the traditional gnocchi day) but it was close enough. The gnocchi were like little pillows of air, they were perfect and the lamb ragu was rich and hearty. For second courses, mom had the beef stew with potato puree and said it was delicious with a bit of a spicy kick to it. I had the wild boar with chocolate sauce, which may sound odd, but it was terrific, it was not like dumping a sweet spoonful of chocolate on the meat, it was a hearty full of flavor dish, that was perfect for such a rainy night. We had a side dish of punterelle, because we love it so much and it was also delicious, the anchovy dressing was savory, it was a perfect accompaniment to the main dishes. We ended the meal with 2 espresso and considered having dessert just to stay out of the rain, but we were full and getting tired and had an early morning the next day. The total cost of this dinner was €83.

Thursday, November 29th

It was an early morning for us, since our flight was scheduled to leave Rome at 9:55am. Rome cabs was at the hotel to pick us up at 6:15am and we were on our way.

Our last "meal" in Rome was at a coffee bar in the gate area of the airport and it was surprisingly good, the pastry was fresh and the cappuccino was hot, it was a great way to end another terrific, food-filled trip to Rome!