Eating Local: English Menus + Reservations

We have visited Italy twice since the pandemic. Initially (2021) there was great caution. Masks were worn everywhere and we were routinely asked for our COVID vaccination cards. Last year, most all of these restrictions had been lifted and life seemed to return to the pre-pandemic normal. We also seek out the small local eateries and enjoy the great food we find there. I have not seen any change in the menus pre vs post. We do however make dinner reservations; not only because we are concerned about getting a table but because the chefs in small restaurants shop daily for what they will be serving and it is helpful for them to know how many guests to expect. So as we are wandering the streets in the morning or afternoon, we decide where we will have dinner and stop in to reserve a table.

The "English Menu" thing as well as menus of pictures has been discussed many times; and in the deep recesses of that strategy of avoiding them, may be a kernel of logic, but people overuse it, and it is somewhat outdated.

Certainly avoid those places that look like tourist traps, those on main squares with extensive menus that look to date from 10 years ago, but technology means that small places can produce a simple menu, with Google translated English descriptions. Their willingness to cater to customers is a good sign.

Myself, I too look for smaller places. I am more interested that, while they may have a standard menu, that they feature seasonal items, either on the menu or as a separate sheet, or even a chalkboard, regardless of language. Other tourists there really is not a detraction, there are lots of people that seek out small good places. I hear often on here people saying the place was all "locals", that's silly, you have no idea where people are from by looking at them. By language you say? Well, in Italy, guess what nationality comprises the largest tourist group? Italians. I have had many great meals in places chock full of "tourists".

An Edit: Almost forgot the biggest change since the pandemic. Many places have scrapped menus all together, providing just a QR code for you to scan and bring up the menu. Problem is, you need either Data service or Wi-Fi to use. They likely still have some paper menus...but the risk is those are out of date.

Regarding reservations. I suppose if there is a specific restaurant that you want to eat at on a specific night, and you are certain about the "provenance" of the place, then go ahead. I never have from the US, weeks before the night. I like to see the place with my own two eyes before committing. But then, I do not go to the "in" places that some famous food show went to (I more avoid them). I will, once there, maybe make a reservation for later in the week, or earlier in the day, if the place is popular or I want to be certain to get a table. However, the majority of times, it is simply walk up and get a table.

I have found many of my best experiences by reading blogs. I can get a sense of what the person likes to eat and the places they like to go, if their style matches mine, then generally their recommendations are good. I avoid TripAdvisor and other sites with random reviews, except as a lead to investigate a place further.

IMO an english menu is not an instant turn off unless it is the primary menu. The english translation should be secondary, below the italian or on the back.

As unromantic as it sounds, I honestly recommend checking the reviews for places on Google Maps. There are a lot of tourists who will go online to write scathing reviews if the place is really a tourist trap. Take these with a grain of salt. Also look at pictures posted by reviewers.

I've never had a reservation for a meal in Italy made prior to travel.

And you don't need to do that now. You can make reservations online in most cases the day-of

From an Italian point of view....
English menus:
of course if a restaurant has even a menu in English is because foreign tourists are target of that place, but the point is the quality of the food. Italians, when the food is good, are not concerned at all to eat in a place where the menu is even in English. What is always important to remember is that there are (touristicly talking) two Italys: Venice+Florence+Rome+Cinque Terre+ Naples, versus everything else. In the first Italy are concentrated the 80% of foreign tourists. Is where you easily find tourist traps where the quality of food is low and you find only "standard dishes". Often with big menu in English with photos of the food.
Instead, when you are in the "second" Italy (that is the 80% of the Country) a menu in English is only a service to the foreign customers, to help to understand a little more what is served. Is not at all related to the food quality.
Reservations:
Is a great "DEPENDS". If you want to be sure to have a table in a specific restaurant (chosen in the afternoon or weeks before doesn't matter) a reservation is better. In any case I suggest to ask to your hotel: in the "second" Italy there are two tricky days where several restaurants are closed: Sunday (in business cities, like the ones of Emilia-Romagna for example, where there are much more people eating out during the week) and Monday (standard weekly closure for the restaurants opened on Sunday, still followed by several star rated restaurants!).

The summer time is very busy. It also seems, by posts written, that everyone is now looking for where the locals eat. So post pandemic, with several restaurants closed permanently, I would make a reservation as you are out walking and see a restaurant you wish to eat in. You may need to be flexible about what time you eat.

We were in Italy this past September. Some of the places we visited we had troubles getting reservations for dinner that evening. We, like you, see a place that day that interests us and want to make reservations for that night. This happened in Bolzano ( where our hotel ended up getting us a reservation ) and Corvara. In Venice we were able to eat at great out of the way places, but late around 8pm. This was actually ok with us. We had no issues on Lake Garda.

Kbj, I select restaurants almost word-for-word how you described it. I was in Italy twice this past year - June and September. As Ricky separated the cities into two categories, my first trip was a solo one where I was at cities in his second category, and the September trip was my daughter’s first trip to Europe where we were mostly in the first category cities.

For the second category, my Parma hotel made a reservation for me at the restaurant I wanted to eat at again during this trip; they’ve expanded to use some of the hotel’s courtyard now, too. I saw people turned away that evening for no reservation.

For others, I mostly stayed two nights at locations, so I would request a reservation the first day for the second night. That’s also how my daughter & I ate at a perfect spot in Ferrara - also saw people turned away either by phone (we were near the front desk) or walking into the restaurant. The same for Salerno.

One way I worked around it was eating at a place for lunch instead of dinner. When I travel solo, if I’m having a nice lunch, I will just have a light dinner, just something from the grocery store, or appetizers in a piazza.

For the first category locations during the September trip, we mainly did the roaming method or had our nice meal during lunch with the options for dinner listed above. I wanted to give her the experience how to choose a restaurant. By the time we reached Amalfi, she was understanding it very well. That still is my favorite way - hope it continues to be a viable option.

English is now the most spoken second language in the world. If a Norwegian travels to Italy, chances are he won't speak Italian and the Italian he's trying to deal with won't speak Norwegian. But they could both, more than likely, communicate somewhat in English.

The English language menu is becoming more and more popular. The turnoffs are things like a signs saying "We serve spaghetti"-- as seen in Varenna--and waiters outside trying to coax you in. (If the food was really good, they wouldn't need to coax you in.)

I also find that it depends on where you are for reservations. But, I now mostly make reservations at least earlier in the day just to make sure I get a table. What I have found are some restaurants who refuse to take my reservation because I am dining solo.

I've posted versions of the "system" we use here before, but not lately. We've spent almost 365 days in Italy, mostly eating lunches not dinners, and have only picked a restaurant we didn't thoroughly enjoy maybe three times.

1. Type of place. Small, very local or at least regional food, either a family business or is run like one, an osteria or trattoria or a street food place is usually more our style than a restaurant (but in what the place CALLS itself there are many exceptions both ways). We're not looking for "locals," we're looking for good food.

2. Service. Unfussy and informal is our preference, with the servers and owners treating us in a normal human way rather than in an obviously professional way.

3. Décor. We like casual and idiosyncratic (perhaps personal to the owner like decorated with his or her own paintings) rather than arty or stylish or super-modern décor (but there have been surprising exceptions to this!) Paper placemats can be a good sign.

4. Menu. Check out the restaurant's website, or photos of the menu online, or walk by the place and look at the menu. We look for an interesting but short and seasonal menu, consistently careful about the food. A long, long menu is a warning sign. Remember to order what the restaurant does well instead of something on the menu that is not their specialty, like, say, pizza in a seafood restaurant.

5. Antipasti and pasta. Look for good antipasti especially the house antipasti. House-made or at least hand-made fresh pasta is our favorite but there is plenty of good pasta that isn't.

6. Reviews. On Tripadvisor, etc., we look for the ratings and reviews by both Italians and non-Italians. It can be instructive to compare the two. Obviously, it's good to see very few "terrible" reviews, but we read ALL the "terrible" reviews to see what the problem was --- these are often hilariously easy to discount, like "The place was crowded and we had to sit next to the bathroom" or "They wouldn't let me bring my dog." We like to see reviews weighted towards "excellent" and "very good." We USE reviews rather than believe reviews. It's fine for an owner to respond to a poor review, but isn't excessively arguing. We tend to disregard bad reviews from the same town and also disregard reviewers (good or bad) with only that one review. We don't pay much attention to whether reviewers think the value ratio is good or not. We look at photos of the food ("How much does the kitchen play with or decorate the food?" is a big question for us --- we want to EAT it not exclaim over how pretty or creative it is). Remember that a popular Irish pub in an Italian town can be #1 on TripAdvisor, while the small, local menu, excellent osteria on a side street is #37.

7. Recommendations from food writers or bloggers or guidebooks. Every once in a while, a google on something like "Best restaurants in Puglia" turns up a nice place. These may or may not be what we want, or may be way out of date. But we read them and compare the writers' criteria to our own.

8. Recommendations from your hotel or rental or B&B hosts (or anybody!). These may or may not be the kind of place we like to eat ---- it's a little hard to describe (even in fairly decent Italian) the kind of restaurant we are looking for, and, like us in our home town, people have favorite places to eat for all kinds of reasons including that a family member owns it or the cook makes one single dish better than anybody else.

9. Dessert. We often don't order the dessert --- it tends to be less special and less local, and we prefer getting gelato from a great gelato place later on. Maybe just a small cookie of some sort and a digestivo and/or an espresso.

10. We are wary of places with a view or that are in full sight of anything popular.

11. Yes, do make a reservation. A place with "plenty of empty tables" can be full an hour later with people who made reservations.

We've had success several times in Italy and other late-dining places, by walking by a restaurant we're interested in around lunch time, and asking about a reservation that evening earlier than the normal local dinner time - say, about 6 pm (our normal time at home). The folks were generally happy to accommodate us, knowing that we'd be done and gone before the locals came in for the evening.

You have recieved some great advice, but I'll add my thoughts. You don't need to worry about menus in English, but what you should worry about is if English the most prominent language. Having an English menu or a translation of the dishes on the menu is nothing strange.

But if the most prominent language on signs and menus is English, that tells you that it is a place that sees tourists as their main market. A "good" example is Café Gråmunken in Stockholm, https://goo.gl/maps/pTMnBwDpgL6HfayE7 Located on the busiest street in Gamla stan they are making money by selling bad food to tourists at inflated prices. Don't believe me? Look at the reviews: https://www.tripadvisor.se/Restaurant_Review-g189852-d3478084-Reviews-Cafe_Gramunken-Stockholm.html You don't attract locals by advertising "Traditional Swedish Fika" in large letters.

Yes you can and should stay flexible! - by either making a res early or the day before. TIP: we used Whatsapp and if the restaurant was also on Whatsapp (most were because it uses wifi not data) it was easy to call or text and make a reservation. Our spotty Italian was easier to use when texting in combo with google translate.
Have fun!

You don't attract locals by advertising "Traditional Swedish Fika" in large letters.

It's not that hard to find kanelbullar and coffee in Stockholm. Yum.

I wonder how many tourists that go to that restaurant ask for it "to go?" That sort of negates the entire concept of Fika

This place is the absolute best.

I am awestruck by the detailed, excellent responses so freely given.

Thank you - each and every one of you - for taking the time to share your thoughts in response to my queries. I really appreciate it.

I'm not clear on how to respond to individual posts, or @ the individual user names - as I am writing this I cannot see the user names of the folks that responded. Please know that I read every response, and took the advice to heart. I will use it for the betterment of our family trip.

I adore travel always, particularly travel in Italy. I'll have two teen boys in tow on their very first trip to Italy, and a husband whose experience is limited to our week exploring Rome 20 years ago. So we'll definitely be in the prime tourist areas, gawking at the sites with the rest of the horde but determinedly heading towards the back streets when it's time to eat. It's going to be fabulous! I guess I've just gotten to the age where I'm wary about taking for granted that things will be the way I remember...

Again, thank you to all for your time in sharing your thoughts.

In my experience, it depends where you’re going and how important food is to you as a part of travel. I was in Italy for two weeks in June 2022 with a RS tour that offered multiple opportunities for dining outside of the group meals and again in September for two weeks with my husband. On trip one, I totally winged it — either stopping in at lunch to ask for a dinner reservation or just popping in and hoping. For trip two, I researched Venice and Bologna, the first two cities we visited, and made a few reservations by email for places that were recommended by food blogs, etc. I think you’ll be fine with your strategy of looking for smallish restaurants outside the big tourist haunts. Hope you’ll have a great trip.

. . . which approach did you think ultimately served you better?

kbj, I think it depends on how important the places you eat are to you. For us, we don't look for well-known places with multiple reviews from the internet. We are mostly interested in not wasting time, just decent meals. So we look for places that are in the area of where we are at the time of day we want to eat. Dinner being preferably someplace walkable close to the hotel. And we've found some gems home and abroad just using our judgment. And you'll see the primary criteria for RS recommendations in the guidebooks are not based on finding the most foodie-friendly places, but rather on location.

You don't attract locals by advertising "Traditional Swedish Fika" in large letters.

But you could attract a lot of Italian males! (I let you search what "fika", even if is written with the "c", means in Italian) . :-D

asking about a reservation that evening earlier than the normal local dinner time - say, about 6 pm

Time for meals is important and in Italy we follow a different timetable than in US. In general we have lunch between 12-15 and dinner 20-23 (in southern Italy could be 20-1am, mainly during the week end). Outside these limits the kitchen of the restaurant is closed, so no reservations are accepted. If they accept to serve a dinner at 6pm means that foreign tourists a re a very important target (if not the main one). Doesn't means that is junk food, but if you prefer a restaurant used only or mainly by Italians be prepared to have dinner not before 8pm.
(could be done a long digression about timetable, because correctly you should call the Italian meal at midday "dinner" and the evening meal "supper". In fact in Italy doesn't exist a late night supper, but the midday meal is more important than a simple "lunch").

Many places have scrapped menus all together, providing just a QR code for you to scan and bring up the menu.

Is true. And there are even places who print two menus: one in Italian only, the other in English only. So, again, even receive a menu only in English doesn't mean that is a restaurant for foreign tourists only.

So post pandemic, with several restaurants closed permanently,

Some restaurants have been closed, but other ones have been opened. Are the new ones better or worst? I don't know, but in fact in the last year there are several new interesting places. Some new restaurants have young chefs who pay more attention to new trends: organic food, short supply chain, seasonality, fusion food....
Could be nice eat once an old style "tagliatelle alla bolognese" with a huge amount of greasy bolognese sauce, but eat a newer lighter version could be healthier!

@History Traveler (and others) Our best, most memorable meals were in restaurants I found in various food blogs, researched on review sites and booked in advance. For us, food is a big part of travel; we wing it for lunch and some dinners but like to have a couple of reservations in hand. If you’d like Venice, Bologna or Lucca specifics, I’m happy to provide.

The RS tour, which I took as a solo traveler, was all about winging it for dinners that were on our own, although our guide made helpful suggestions.

@ricky, yes I am aware that late supper is the norm in Italy. But that is one thing I dislike - eating right before bedtime, even if it is authentic to the culture. i just dont expect every meal to be an opportunity for a cultural experience. And that way the later-dining locals don't have to put up with our loud American talking, demands for ice and complaints about no spaghetti and meatballs🙂. Even if the kitchen is serving us yesterday's leftovers.

I'm really curious ... which approach did you think ultimately served you better? Do you think you ate better "winging it," or using research and reservations to select places ahead of time?

In my experience, it is a mix. Food is one of the main reasons I travel, so any place I go, I have a short list of some places gleaned from blogs, searches, and even random investigations off Google maps. However, once on the ground, everything gets the onceover, how's it look?, Do they get a decent crowd? What does the menu look like?. I also keep an eye out for other places, many small places just never make the internet radar, or if mentioned, have no website, other than a basic Facebook page.

Which is better? Neither, done just fine winging it, had great meals from places I researched. I will say though, that it is more likely a place I researched, I wind up not going to, once I see the place and have a look around, or find an unknown place that looks more appealing.

I returned from Italy a week ago and in my experience, everything is back to normal in restaurants and everywhere else. I did not encounter any QR codes, and menus were in Italian, English, or both, as usual. There are lots of tourists everywhere (yes, in February) lots of them Italian, as usual. Italians do love to see their country.

!!!>>>>> later-dining locals don't have to put up with our loud American talking, demands for ice and complaints about no spaghetti and meatballs🙂. Even if the kitchen is serving us yesterday's leftovers.>>>>>>>

That is pretty disparaging.
Really did not need that in the post. Sounds like a victim of your own stereotype. And incorrect at that.

Where are you going? We were in Rome, Siena, and Oriveto in late Oct early Nov. I agree things are different. We made reservations by calling before we left home. We found most of the places we wanted you had to call. We did see many people turned away without reservations
I would make a few before leaving home.

That is pretty disparaging. Really did not need that in the post.
Sounds like a victim of your own stereotype. And incorrect at that.

I don't know if you saw the "🙂", but that usually means the post is intended in a humorous way.

If they accept to serve a dinner at 6pm means that foreign tourists a re a very important target

Even if my days as a waiter /kitchen slave are long gone, I am still adamant that being ready to serve dinner at 6 PM any day means they do not thoroughly clean the kitchen any day between lunch and dinner time.

or an English menu keep walking until there isn't one

Never been in the 80% of Italy rightly described by Ricky.

Far from the tourists' path, in places catering to locals, they can translate the menu using the English they remember from their school days and copying from other menus on the web. It is not a big problem. Everybody has a PC and took English at school. If not, there is always a teen around who's able to use Google.

For sure it's ten times easier than hiring a waiter that speaks a good English. Simply because most waiters that speak a good English work where their language skills are appreciated and tested every day.

I think some of the OP's misinformation is outdated.

English menus.- I hate to break it to people but that small little restaurant that Americans think only Italians go to has probably been discovered by Americans/English travelers before you. I'd say nowadays almost 75% of the restaurants I have been to in Europe have English menus. It just means that the owners have noticed that the Instagram/NYTimes Anglo-crowd has found this restaurant and they want to make it easier.

The same way with picture menus.If you go to Japan you will see that EVERY restaurant has pictures of the food. Rarely does it mean it's a bad place to eat. Pictures just make it easier for their patrons to know what kind of food they are ordering.

Again - thank you to all who shared their experiences and took the time to post a response here. I saw a couple of other questions in this thread and another on the Italy forum so I think y'all are helping several of us - thank you !

@SA - you asked where we will be, and it's primarily Ricky's group of locales most heavily frequented by tourists: Venice, Rome, Florence, Sorrento are our bases. There will be some slipping off to Volterra, Turin and Lucca but I don't expect anywhere to be a tourist escape this summer. Someone upthread in country now mentioned crowds in February - I think it's going to be wild this summer!

@heather - agree that my prior experience leading to the question might be outdated, and feel like I acknowledged the sentiment pretty openly. I don't agree that asking questions = misinformation. Also feel like I have to defend myself from the implication that I'm thinking I'll find some place that no English speaker has ever before seen. I'm not that arrogant, and that's not my motivation at all. Can't speak for others, but I don't think that's really the motivation of people in tune enough to be posting/reading here. I think most of us are looking to maximize authenticity in our limited time.

It sounds like the consensus on the reservation question is it depends on several factors, including your location, priority re: food and season of travel. It also sounds like there might be a bumper crop of tourists in Italy this year (pent up demand?). Given that we're a group of 4, we like small places, we'll be in big tourist draw areas and in the season when things are ramping up to high season - I think we'll do a mix of exploration and reservation. For now, I've settled on reservations for the opening night on arrival in a new base, leaving open the opportunity to grab a reservation while we're on the ground and can see potential. That seems like the right balance for us - your mileage may vary!

A bit late, but just from personal experience, I was in Venice and Ferrara in late September/early October and pretty much had to have made reservations, particulalry on weekends. Some places were fully booked for several days in advance.

As to English menus, there is a place just inside the walls of Bologna that looks like it comes from a bygone age: the menus have very poorly done clipart, are in Italian with some marvellous English translations (fiore di latte is down as "milky cow cheese") everything about the place shouts "no" - yet is is normally packed with locals, serves excellent food at reasonable prices - and I try and eat there every time I am in the area.