Italy: Venice, Tuscany, Amalfi, Rome

Had a nice Italian meal last night in Vancouver with friends prompted me to drag this up for a post. The notes below are from 2011, our first trip to Italy. Funny how exotic the food app seemed at that time! I literally put on 15lbs on this trip, ordering antipasti, primi, secondi dolce everywhere we went, along with sampling a few too many gelato shops. We relied on Michelin Guide, Gambero Rosso and chowhound website for research and planning.

In Venice we had our hotel breakfast, had a very light lunch at Café Florian, and went to the Met restaurant. The food was quite good, seemed very original rather than traditional Venetian food but clearly had local flavours. The room was quite nice, well decorated and with good service. Food was presented very well, the dishes that stood out were a eel/swordfish/pigeon main and a really rich tiramisu pudding desert. Wine selection was excellent, had a couple of very nice desert wines from the region by the glass.

We were only in Florence for a short stop to see Uffizi, and David, ate at Trattoria Due G. Great classic pastas, Tuscan mains, friendly people, we enjoyed ourselves.

In Tuscany we ate at our hotel the first night (Terre di Nano-excellent accommodation just outside montepulciano). It was homemade spaghetti and roasted boar made by the friendly lady who runs the place served on the terrace with a lovely view, nothing mind blowing but a great simple Tuscan experience. The next night we ate at La Porta in Monticchiello. They have a nice view towards Pienza, great place to watch the sunset. More traditional Tuscan dishes, the food was good but certainly not great, place is probably too busy for their own good as the service was lacking. Wine selection was good, we had a nice bottle of Brunello and a few glasses of Nobile as this place was only a 30 min walk through the countryside. Driving around southern Tuscany we stopped in Radicofani, we stumbled upon La Grotta, a great little restaurant right in the centre of the old town. We were the only tourists here but was still quite busy at lunch. The pasta was great, felt like a very authentic experience. Just outside Montalcino was the restaurant Boccon di Vino (watch out putting into your gps, it will send you to sant’angelo in colle, as will viamichelin) one of our favourites from the trip. They have a beautiful view, overlooking vast Tuscan fields. I had a great pasta with beef main, my partners dish was also excellent, a very light fig based desert was well done, and a great wine selection. The service was flawless and friendly. There prices were very reasonable also, I would recommend anyone in the area to try and make a stop here. The following day ate in Volpaia, had a great meal in a small restoraunt in town, good food, the mille-feuille desert was memorable.

We had lunch at Arnolfo on our forth day in Tuscany. It is near San Gimignango, a well preserved mediviel town with its famous towers that one of us found fascinating. Arnolfo is a small, beautiful room with two windows overlooking a valley, very classic Tuscany with elegance. There were only 4 tables dining, the head chef came out and introduced himself, a very courteous gentleman. We both ate the contemporary tasting menu. This was the sort of meal that flowed so beautifully that it is hard to really recollect the exact courses, sufficient to say taste, flavours and presentation were awe inspiring. The service was flawless. Of all the fine dining restaurants on our trip this was the clear favourite. If you are even considering one splurge meal on your trip do not miss out (we also found it a nice break from mostly repetitive menus elsewhere in Tuscany)

Although a tough act to follow Le 2 Forchette del Chianti, a casual resto with lighter dinner options was a great choice much later that evening, we shared the cheesecake which is typically recommended here and it was excellent. We were not overly impressed with Ristoro di Lamole although I think we may have been simply tiring of the same cuisine, there is nothing particularly off-putting about it, however nothing really stands out either except for the view. We made a couple of stops in L'Antica Delizia were not disappointed either time, great gelato.

After driving down from Tuscany to the Sorrentine peninsula we had our biggest disappointment of the trip, Don Alfonso (who have since opened a restaurant closer to home in Toronto). This is a restaurant that was been acclaimed pretty much everywhere, including, NYTimes a couple of times, Michelin, Gambero Rosso, F. Plotkin’s book, every travel guide etc. The room itself is very nice, a bright white walls well decorated, good silverwear/stemwear, but that is pretty much where it ended for us. We ordered the tasting menu. Of what I remember, there was an unimpressive tasting amuse bouche, a smoked fish and a consume pasta that were both good, guinea fowl was decent, duck with banana sauce that I did not enjoy, a swordfish course that was far too strongly seasoned and overly salty, a nice selection of cheeses, and a traditional cake with a lemon based sauce for desert which was terrible. The petit fours were also subpar. There is no question that they use great local ingredients, however the tastes and flavour combinations were simply off to bad in most of the dishes. There was very little effort in terms of presentation, I’m assuming that they were going for simplicity to match with the white walls etc but clearly there was no art precision or time required to make these dishes (we were 4 courses into the meal within 50mins). The service was very poor, servers had poor attitude and seemed forced. Cutlery was missing for several courses, a wine list was not provided after we finished our champagne and were already eating the 2nd course, the sommelier offered little in terms of suggestions. The two maitre d’ (the chef’s wife +son) was constantly coming by each table to rave about each dish, which may have been enjoyable if they were actually good but in our case it came across as especially annoying. Then a few glairing errors, my partner left about half of her guinea fowl dish the server was very eager to take her dish away which she was ok with, however, he also took mine as I was eating it (ie fork in hand mouth full and unable to complain) – I was stunned. At the end of all of this, the bill is presented, the waiter hands the cc machine with the tip choice already selected “a tip for our service?” (as he had done to the two other tables in our room) never before in any fine establishment have I ever been verbally asked for a tip, and none was left. A tour of the wine cellar was declined. It is hard to find a negative comment about this restaurant anywhere (except tripadvisor for what its worth) yet I cannot fathom that this was simply an ‘off night’ .

After some careful discussion we decided not to let one night change our plans for the rest of the trip, and continued to Taverna del Capitano for lunch the following day, and were glad we did. It is a gorgeous setting right over the sea, the interior is slightly more modest, still fine. We ate a huge variety of fish all perfectly prepared and very fresh, with an excellent scampi lemon risotto,a fried pasta encrusted fish, and a hot stone fish course really standing out. For desert we had variety of citrus flavoured deserts including the same type of traditional lemon cake and petit fours, both of which were excellent. Service is not overly formal but still excellent and friendly. The chef was very friendly and greeted us after the meal. The complexity is not as ambitious as don alfonso so a fair comparison is difficult, but the overall meal experience was so much better that my partner could not resist telling the chef- who seemed to smile knowingly.
We had a lunch in Amalfi the following day at da gemma, it was a great spot, more citrus and lemon flavours and well prepared fish, modest prices, seemed like a great recommendation considering the number of tourist traps in town. For our last night in Amalfi we drove up to Ravello and ate at Rossellinis. The hotel itself was very impressive with very nice views looking down over the coast. The dining room in the basement had a very rustic feel, they had live music playing which was surprisingly tasteful. I had a well prepared cod dish that was quite good, the real highlight was a lemon soufflé desert that was simply scrumptious. The service was excellent. The wine list was a bit overpriced if I recall correctly. It should be said that despite the tasteful room the place had a bit too much of a ‘hotel restaurant’ kind of atmosphere.

In Rome for our last 4 days we wanted to get back to more casual eating (atleast before the last night). We used the EatRome app on the ipad with the gps and just walked into whatever was close, none of the restaurants really stood out, but they seemed like a lot better alternatives to many, many tourist traps (ie “no frozen food here” sign) . Osteria dell'Ingegno was probably our favourite, Bir & fud was fun, 'gusto was ok, Grapollo d'oro zampano was a miss (burnt lasagne and bad service), Palatium was nice but we didn't eat much. It was nice to sample wines from all the regions in Italy, many of the wine bars we visited had great by the glass selections. We tried 5 or 6 gelato places, all were excellent. Pizzarium and Roscioli pizza were both amazing, defiantly one of the culinary highlights of the trip.
For our last night we dined at La Pergola. It’s a bit of a trip away from central Rome, but not far in a taxi. There are great views over all of Rome, although you can really only make out a handful of buildings from this far. The room is full of a nice art collection, with interesting pieces throughout. The stemware/silverware was as expected for a restaurant of this calibre. The flooring is an aged blue carpet, and the wood lattice panelling around the windows looked like it belonged in a patio set, and the glass panel room divider at the entrance is akin to something you would see at an American pizza joint .. While clearly these criticisms are overstated, in short, I found that the atmosphere, well nice, was not world class. Wine selection was excellent, we had a half bottle of Barbaresco followed by a half bottle of Brunello, I’m not well informed enough to comment on the wine prices but they are certainly much cheaper than we would have paid in Canada. I had a veal starter, the fagotelli (best pasta I have ever had), pigeon, and the grand desert (an assortment). The food was excellent, very carefully prepared, flavours were complex and very carefully nuanced yet remained light, clearly the work of a very exceptional chef. Service was good, not flawless, the level of professionalism simply isn’t the same as I would expect in an equivalent French or even NYC establishment. While the food was certainly excellent, I left mildly disappointed with the restaurant, at this price point dining out for us is about the whole experience. If you want to taste highly refined Italian cuisine, certainly come here, but if you are budgeting this as a ‘once in a lifetime’ dining experience, look elsewhere.