Rome Restaurants to Try

I added so many dishes to the "Rome food to try" that I thought maybe it would be better to separate out the restaurants.  Frankly I find that, although I might do a lot of research on restaurants, we really don't end up at any of them but just drop by a place that looks good.  But it will give us something to think about and we can look at their menus (typically without prices) to give us time to translate the names of their dishes, so we'll know what we're ordering.  And please add your selections to this posting as well.

This is a good place to add Revealed Rome's Eleven Etiquette Mistakes (Not) to Make at an Italian Meal. We already know about the coffee one but "the bread is there as an accompaniment to your primi and secondi, especially to dip into leftover sauces, not as a way to fill you up pre-dinner."  Are you listening, Fernando??

Revealed Rome also lists her "Three No-Fail Rome Restaurants".   These are Flavio al Velavevodetto in Testaccio (see below), Da Danilo, and L'Asino d'Oro (also below).

al Velavevodetto

al Velavevodetto

Flavio al Velavevodetto

Flavio al Velavevodetto

On Serious Eats is a recent (July 2014) posting by Katie Parla: 8 Must-Visit Restaurants in Rome.   One is an Eat and Go (Mordi e Vai) stand in the Testacchio mercato that offers 3 euro panini and is also written up in Rome Digest.

And on Eating Italy's June 2014 post, Tavole Romane lists her current favorite restaurants, one of which is by a Colombian: Metamorfosi, but it is a bit beyond our budget.  Anyway, I want traditional Roman food, not cutting edge food.

Agustarello
We might as well start alphabetically.  This is a trattoria in Testaccio that is famous for its offal, including coratella and rigatoni con pajata, but these are only available in spring.   It was one of Katie Parla's 10 Best Trattorias in 2011.

L'Asino d'Oro
Another of Parla's Top 10, this one is located in Monti and has a facebook page with photos of its dishes which look too exquisite for us.  But it is relatively close to Via Napoli.  Here is its menu on Menuale but it changes daily.  Revealed Rome liked it a lot and mentioned the weekday lunches: €12 for an antipasto, primo, secondo, glass of wine, and water. She said the dishes weren't as inventive as at dinner and smaller but she had pumpkin soup, ravioli with ricotta, and lamb stewed with artichokes, which sound awfully nice to me.  It is also one of Bread, Cakes and Ale's two favorite Rome restaurants, which says the price in October of 2013 was €13.

Flavio al Velavevodetto
Located on Monte Testaccio, this little trattoria is a favorite of Katie Parla and Revealed Rome, and Carlo Petrini.  RR recommends their amatriciana and their fritto misto vegetale.  Elizabeth Minchilli like it too, especially the view of the broken amphorae.  They also have a new location Piazza dei Quiriti 5 near Vatican City.

Il Pinsere
Remember Tony's Pizza Napoletana in San Francisco?  Maybe this one will be like that since it is near the apartment on Via Flavia.  It is a takeout pizzeria that is only open M-F from 9:00-14:00 and it is extremely popular on Trip Advisor although I had originally heard about it from someplace else.  Actually, what they serve isn't exactly pizza but pinse, an oval Roman flatbread with toppings, according to the Rome Digest.  The only drawback is that I'm not sure if we will be in that vicinity during its open hours.

Nonna Betta
Remember the falafels in Paris?  Here's a Kosher restaurant in the Jewish ghetto that serves falafels and only 5 euros apiece!  It's a minor item on the menu but the rest looks very Roman except that they add a vegetable to those Roman pasta dishes so that you get a carbonara di zucchine and a tagliolini cacio, pepe e cicoria.  The bucatini all'amatriciana del ghetto is on the meat menu but what do they use instead of guanciale and pecorino romano?  It must be hard to be kosher in Rome and never eat the pork products or mix the meat with the pecorino romano.  Or is it possible to eat the primo piato as a milk dish and the secondo as a meat?    Are eggs meat or dairy?  Nonna Betta does have abbacchio al forno con patate and abbacchio al scottadito but their menu also says that some things are only served in season.  I hope that carciofi are in season all year.