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Restaurants in Rome from TV?

Posted by (Madison, WI) on

Hi RS Friends,
I'm trying to figure out which restaurants we'd like to try in Rome in April. I decided to try a little bit different approach to finding restaurants — I reviewed the RS Rome videos as well as a few Anthony Bourdain Rome videos, and I found the restaurants the show hosts visited in those episodes. We did this for our Las Vegas trip in 2016; we ate at Bouchon at The Venetian because we'd seen it in one of Anthony Bourdain's videos. And the food there was to die for! :-)

The Rome restaurants in Rick Steves/Anthony Bourdain videos are:
Enoteca Corsi
Osteria dal 1931
Ristorante il Gabriello
Trattoria a Morgana

Do any of you have experience with these restaurants? If so, what did you think? Yay or nay? Or are there any absolute "musts" in Rome that I should also consider?

We're interested in restaurants frequented by locals that have great food and good service. Non-English menus are fine and actually preferred since we don't want to get stuck in restaurants that cater a lot to tourists. I know enough Italian to read menus and order food for the two of us. (My husband seems to know "arrivederci" and that's it! LOL.)

I thought I would check with all of you about these restaurants. I've found the RS forum so incredibly helpful and insightful with my trip planning! :-)

Posted by
11701 posts

We have followed up on Anthony Bourdain's choices of restaurants while traveling too. Recently we had a fun meal on Hong Kong in a tiny noodle shop that Anthony had featured.
Sorry I don't know these in Rome. In Rome we used two Apps, Elizabeth Minichelli ' EAT ROME" and "Katie Parla's Rome", well worth the small price to purchase them.

Posted by
105 posts

Suki, I'm glad I'm not the only one who tries to go with Anthony Bourdain's recommendations!

One of our favorite local restaurants at home (a farm-to-table sort of concept) has a photo of Anthony Bourdain and the head chef on a bulletin board at the front of the restaurant. And the food at that restaurant is incredible. Anthony is gritty and curt, but he knows good food. :-) In fact, I recall in one of his episodes that he mentioned to NOT go to a restaurant recommended by your hotel. He said something like, "wherever the hotel tells you where to eat, don't eat there."

The Rome restaurants from his videos were Osteria dal 1931 and Trattoria a Morgana; Rick Steves dined at Enoteca Corsi and Ristorante il Gabriello.

I assume if I had good luck in the past with eating at a restaurant that I saw on Anthony's show (Bouchon in Vegas), then I probably can't go wrong with Osteria dal 1931 and Trattoria a Morgana.

Posted by
2124 posts

Both Bourdain & Andrew Zimmern are aware of the Roscioli bakery Forno (great burrata/pesto and sausage/broccoli pizza slices), and their salumeria, but down the street is another Roscioli creation, Emma Pizzeria, with nearly-perfect puntarelle (chicory) salad and spaghetti alla Carbonara to die for. Katie Parla recommended this as well. We were there two weeks ago and it was fabulous.

Posted by
92 posts

when i was in sapporo a few weeks ago, in the famous "ramen alley," i noticed that the restaurant anthony bourdain had eaten and filmed in had signs all over it indicating that he'd been there. we went to a ramen shop some doors down, and it was awesome. sometimes a restaurant works well on camera for whatever reason, or is the right place at the right time. i don't think it necessarily means it's the best place for you or even the best place overall.

Posted by
105 posts

Thanks for the responses!

I thought I would try the "I saw this on a Rick Steves/Anthony Bourdain episode" approach just because the online review approach to finding good restaurants in Rome has a few drawbacks in my opinion:
- There are hundreds of restaurants in Rome and thus hundreds of review pages online to sift through!
- A place might be highly rated by tourists because the place catered to tourists.
- I'm really most interested in places that the locals frequent.

Hmph. I feel a little stuck! LOL.

Posted by
8249 posts

You can widen your search and google "food tv rome" and pick up venues covered by Andrew Zimmern and various people from the Food Channel. I also regularly check out these sites when travelling, and generally it results in a good to great meal.

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