reasonable restaurants around Rome

Our favorite was pizza from a stand carried to a bench then gelato. We ate some more expensive meals, and none measured up.

The areas around the Piazza's are usually pricey. There is a great restaurant on the Piazza Navona called Tucci. If you go, ask for Nino as your server. The food is great but it is a little pricy depending on what you order. It's my favorite reataurant in the historic district. If you want reasonable priced places, you will need to get out of the historic district and just walk the streets and check out the restaurants.

You will do better in price and quality as you go off the squares or to other areas. Nearly all restaurants post their menus, so you can get a sense of cost, and if the place is busy, especially with non-english speaking clients, you can make a very rough guess to quality. Some of the best meals were found on the back streets of Rome.

We had a wonderful dinner at Restaurant (Trottaria) Moderne. It was about 85E for 4 of us. It's directly across from Hotel Smeralda near Campo dei Fiori.

Highly recommend looking at Chowhound.com for restaurant recommendations in Rome (go the Italy board). This is foodie site, so the recommendations vary widely in terms of cost (from v. inexpensive to v. expensive). I've gotten a number of good Rome restaurant recommendations from here. I've been mapping them on a custom Google map and will plan on carting that to Rome with me on my laptop so that I have all the places readily accessible.

http://www.chowhound.com/boards/58

Two reasonable places I enjoyed last year were Ristorante dar Pallaro (Largo dei Pallaro 15) east of Campo dei Fiori and Alfredo e Ada (just off Piazza di Orologio) west of Piazza Navonna. Pallaro is mentioned prominently in Rick's book, Alfredo e Ada I came across elsewhere. Both are no-menu-eat-what-we-serve-places with a stereotypical Italian grandmother running the show (I must admit to having a bias for these kind of places). If I remember correctly, in the range of 25 euros per person, crowded enough you'll get to know yr neighbors, good food, and lots of fun.

Our family of 4 was in Rome recently and if your willing to go a few blocks over near the Panthean, Ricks pick, Miscellanea, is a small hole-in-the wall but with outside seating that has wonderful salads and sandwiches that are huge and tasty - pizza's were good too for a change. Great value. but you won't find white table cloths etc.

Tom:

We were in Rome in April and one night we went across the river to Trastevere for dinner. It is a short walk from Campo de Fiori. We had a wonderful dinner at half the price of what we paid to eat in the Campo de Fiori area. I cannot remember the name of the restaurant. Maybe someone can recommend a specific restaurant there. Good luck!

An AWESOME restaurant in Rome is a little place called Ristorante Grotta Azzura. It had THE BEST lemon torte I have eaten in MY LIFE!!! I highly recommend it! It is on Via Palestro n. 93. I don't think it is very expensive and not many people speaking english. (I don't think the waiter spoke english! but it is SO good!

Walk a block or two away from the Piazzas and you will find less expensive and better restaurants. Look for restaurants that have the menu in Italian and patrons that are locals. Trastevere is a great area for this type of restaurant and it is a short walk across the pedestrian bridge - Ponte Sisto.