Curious how to avoid a “tourist-trap” restaurant in Italy? Read on.
Curious how to avoid a “tourist-trap” restaurant in Italy? Coral here to help you make some better informed dining decisions! A lot of these tips come from my experienced POV living in Florence for over a decade, but I hope many can be applied to wherever your travels lead you especially in hotspot destinations!
Instead of shaming businesses (who are all just trying to make a living and pay their employees/rent), I’d rather focus on how to spot restaurants worthiest of your caloric intake.
Bear in mind, you are also a tourist and Italy is a tourist haven. 58 million tourists visited Italy last year. That’s equal to the entire country’s population. There’s no way to avoid it, you’ll never be the one unicorn tourist in a restaurant and everyone else isa local except you in a hotspot city like Florence.
And frankly, there is nothing wrong with being a tourist in a restaurant amongst other tourists. It by no means deems it a “trap” if fellow tourists are present.
Still there are steps you can take to ensure that you are getting the most genuine meal possible. It will take planning and booking ahead. A lot of these seem like no brainers and there are slight generalizations rife with exceptions.
And yes, you could probably waltz in somewhere “following your gut”, but it is very easy to get catfished for bad or mediocre food in Italy. Even if you think it looks like some hidden gem only you discovered. Trust me.
If you don’t care deeply about what you eat on holiday and are easy going about food, by all means click away now. BUT if you eat like you give a damn, and get upset over mediocre meals (that is, if your palate can detect nuance and isn’t easily dazzled by gimmicks and cheap blasts of umami), the best way to guarantee an unforgettable meal in Italy is to read on my friends, do your research, follow the rabbit hole and don’t be afraid to ask the locals.
Or… When in doubt, join one of our progressive food tours in Florence or our La Grassa food tour in Bologna to get directed to remarkable food in town.
Stay up to date with the latest from Italy plus plenty more insider morsels and travel guides: http://eepurl.com/cEl6cf
At Trattoria Sabatino, where you can get a no-frills bowl of brodo, roast/grilled/boiled meats worthy of Sunday suppers, Tuscan veg sides and plates of fennel salami. Photo: Coral Sisk.
Do’s
1. Consult local blogs
While a biased “do”, I know first hand as a professional food writer (find my clips HERE) the amount of work that goes into compiling lists and the screening process our editors put in.
As a result when I travel, I always defer to the local culinary experts, trusted food-focused publications compiled by locals who live in the place or know the city well and legitimate blogs.
Again biased from my own experiences with Curious Appetite, being on the ground makes a huge difference. Sure, listicles on major travel websites like NYT Travel can come in handy, but they’re often out of date and written by people who either are passing by and don’t spend much time nor live and breathe a city day in day out.
The writers I tend to trust for food recommendations have immersed themselves in the culture often for years, they speak the language (or know food very well) and have eaten their way through many a restaurant. They also have their ears to the local dining scene, so you know they have the scoop on any hot new openings or old favorites that have fallen by the wayside.
On that note, never be afraid to ask your tour guide for tips. They’re bound to have a few gems that they’ll be more than happy sharing. In Italy, I also defer to culinary associations like Ristoranti del Buon Ricordo to find time honored traditional restaurants. Sometimes the Michelin Guide has some solid picks that are beyond their stars. I also really enjoy Italian publications like Spacedelicious and Tuorlo.
2. Look for cucina casalinga or cucina tipica
Down-to-earth Italian trattorias are falling into extinction in Italy’s major cities, and it breaks my heart. Call it a restaurant for the proletariat, but a trattoria is a spot where there is a seat for everyone.
The comfort food feels like it’s been whipped up by your surrogate Italian family effortlessly. Don’t expect presentation pony tricks here. The Italian trattoria is the master of cucina casalinga or blue collar fare locals tend to frequent. Cucina Tipica is a key word for “typical cuisine, or traditional home-style eating.
So how can you find cucina casalinga or cucina tipica? A hand-written menu is always a good first sign. This means the food is seasonal and prepared fresh daily, often in response to whatever the chef found at the fishmonger, the market or the butcher that morning. Also, googling “dove mangiare cucina tipica a (insert city name) tends to drum up Italian compiled lists.
In addition to this, there’s gotta be at least one old guy or nonna in the kitchen. They’re usually the owner or the mama/papa of the owner and you can bet they didn’t go to culinary school.
Instead, they’re cooking the dishes they grew up eating and have mastered over decades toiling over a hot stove for their family, friends and future customers.
And finally, the decor is never nouveau. Think old school wooden furniture, dim lighting and butcher’s paper on the table topped with little more than a basket of bread and some good extra virgin olive oil that doesn’t smell rancid. When your food is hearty, humble and traditional, you don’t need to worry about the decor.
A handwritten menu that’s not as long as the Bible is always a good sign. Photo: Coral Sisk.
3. Keep it regional
Before leaving for Italy, do a little research on the food that is native to the city or region you are visiting. Why? Because aside from pizza, the Italian classics you know and love are not ubiquitous.
In Florence for example, we aren’t eating steaks on the regular nor fettuccine alfredo, and this whole trend with mixing pasta in a big parmigiano-reggiano cheese wheel is a tableside theatric pulled at mostly “touristy” restaurants.
Now I get it, cheese is delicious especially when amalgamated with butter and fresh egg pasta, but this type of spaghetti is not representative of Florence. Neither is lasagna.
Instead in Florence, you find lampredotto and tripe stands, salted cod and lots of beans, chicken liver pate smeared on broth soaked stale bread slices, squab and game meat, boiled meats, cardoon thistles, bitter greens and funky cheeses.
These are the things the locals are eating, and more importantly, these are the things they know how to cook well. So always judge a restaurant by the number of local dishes on its menu.
4. Follow a few local rules
One of the easiest and fastest ways to see whether a restaurant caters mostly to tourists or to locals is to look at its opening times. If its kitchen is open for lunch after 2pm or open for dinner before 7:30pm, they are pandering to tourists.
Italians eat lunch early, around midday, lingering over their meal until 2-2:30pm. Then they head back to work, or continue on their day, before coming back together for a quick aperitivo - around 6:30pm - with the earliest acceptable dinnertime starting at 7:30pm. But note, Italians are not Spaniards, they are not in the habit of eating dinner at 10pm. Most Italian kitchens stop seating patrons at around 9:30pm.
Have a hankering for pizza at lunch? You’d do better to do a pizza al trancio or by the slice. Wood-fired pizza ovens are extremely expensive to run and maintain, so the locals tend to splurge for pizza at a pizzeria worth their blistered crust at dinner.
5. Book ahead
Avoid disappointment and always book any restaurants you’re super keen on visiting at least 5-7 days in advance. Sometimes more! Especially in the summer months.
The best times to call restaurants to book are Tuesday-Saturdays and around 12-1pm or 7pm-8pm right when they open or a little bit before if you want to make sure someone picks up.
Calls during prep or in peak service hours might not be answered or met with stressful short replies. I wouldn’t relying on booking online or email, but instead messaging on Instagram if they have a page. More and more places are requiring online bookings. The traditional spots (especially in Florence) are still married to telephone bookings.
And bear in mind, a popular restaurant is usually closed on Sundays/Mondays and often for a few long weeks in August, when the whole country practically goes on vacation.
Set menu at places like Culinaria Firenze, yes! Fixed menu, no.
Don’t’s
1. Eat in tourist squares
“Non si mangia bene in centro storico. I ristoranti in centro storico sono solo per i turisti”
Translation: Doomsday talk by most Italians when discussing the state of dining affairs in their historical center (the way we refer to downtown) and projecting pessimism about eating well or that there’s nothing left but tourist traps.
While technically yes, there are some good places in and around Italy’s major tourist attractions - Rivoire in Florence’s Piazza della Signoria for one - most are not even worth the mention.
These places are expensive, stuffed to the brim with dont’s 2,3,4 and 5 on this list and designed for the tourist who is too tired or too lazy to wander down an alleyway looking for a hidden cafe or something a little more off the beaten track.
That said, my least favorite square for food in Florence is Piazza San Firenze. I joke with my food tour guests anytime we pass by that it’s Dante’s 8th circle of tourist trap dining hell.
2. Avoid sandwich boards
More often than note, these sandwich boards are in high traffic tourist areas advertising fixed menus.
As already noted, the best Italian food is seasonal and regional. Italian food finds its roots in the food its people grew in their own gardens, fished from their own seas, made with their own hands and hunted in their own forests.
A sandwich board written in English that advertises a fixed menu day in day out with no consideration of the season or the locality is not going to be good.
On top of that, they’re often advertising cut price deals like 15-20 euros for a glass of wine and a secondo or main course. In expensive cities like Florence, these deals should be scrutinized more than ever.
How can you expect quality ingredients and quality wine prepared by a restaurant where everyone involved is being paid fairly and overhead costs covered?
These restaurants prioritize quantity over quality. They’re not worried about return customers. They’re just trying to make a quick buck, so they have no incentive to make anything fresh or, frankly, good.
3. Photos of the food or menus in 6 different languages
Most Tuscan food worth eating is usually ugly and not photogenic. There, I said it! If you see photos of the food on the menu or worse still, a menu in any other languages than Italian, English and perhaps French/German if you’re on the northern border, make a beeline for the exit.
I don’t think I need to explain this one, but any of the above means the restaurant caters to tourists and enough tourists that their waiters have grown tired of waiting for people to Google translate their menu into every language under the sun and went the extra mile to take photos.
If a restaurant has enough repeat or WOM patrons to fill its seats, it’s not worrying about whether the odd tourist can read the specials or knows what a dish looks like.
Keep it regional by trying dishes native to the city or region you visit, like these Florentine delights from the Mercato di Sant’Ambrogio. Photo: Coral Sisk.
4. Avoid Italian-American dishes
There is a restaurant in Florence called Vini e Vecchi Sapori that has a sign that reads “No spritz. No pizza”. Yes it sounds a bit mean, but a touch of Florentine no-nonsense snark or “ironia” is always sign that the restaurant you’re visiting caters to locals. In other words, they are making their own food, their own way, without concessions.
As I mentioned in the do’s list, a list of local, regional dishes is definitely a green flag when it comes to choosing a restaurant. A massive red flag is any dish that is not traditionally Italian. Pineapple on pizza, chicken parm, spaghetti Bolognese, baked ziti, garlic bread, steak with dipping sauces or served on hot planks that cook it to medium well, spaghetti and meatballs. These are not Italian dishes, so if you see them on the menu, run as fast as you can.
One caveat on this: If you do have kids and they want spag and meatballs, order spaghetti al pomodoro with a side of polpette. No one will shame you.
5. Menu hawkers
Avoid people asking you to come in or anyone so eager for you to come in that they have people making pasta in the windows. What’s is this, the zoo? To repeat point 3 in our Don’t’s list, this is the call of a restaurant desperate for bums on seats. Why would you pay someone to shout at people passing by? And can you imagine any self-respecting nonno/nonna agreeing to perform for a crowd like a seal?
Well-made traditional food is becoming increasingly more difficult to come by. Some blame mass tourism for disappointing traditional food in Italy’s historic center, but I also blame a lack of will. If it’s easy to make money from tourists by hawking in front of your restaurant then why would you go the extra mile to let your food speak for itself?
And yes, I know taste is subjective, and everyone is an authority these days, but I hope you trust my POV as a certified sommelier, as someone who literally writes about food and does food tours for a living.
