Nicole in Rome

Occasion: Saturday Night Dinner with a Friend

Initial Impressions: We lived in front of the Colosseum for a year and every time we gave a restaurant a try in the neighborhood, it was always a tourist trap with mid-food. So, when Paolo found this place, I was already skeptical. We didn’t see the restaurant at first because there is a small entrance. I was very surprised to see how large the restaurant was in the back. It even had an upstairs dining area. I was nervous going into the restaurant because there only seemed to be one exit and the Californian in me always thinks about how huge of a fire hazard most of Rome continues to be… (Rome has burned a few times in historically so this is ironic). Well, the menu is very large and in both English and Italian. There are basic cocktails offered in addition to a sort of random wine list. It’s random put together, but I guess for this type of restaurant, you shouldn’t expect a sommelier to have come in and curate a selections of wines to enjoy with your meal. However, given that there is a 900 bottle of 2004 Dom Perignon listed LOL you would think that they would do a bit of research. Sorry, but even a 250 euro bottle marked-up to 900 euros can’t help the headache I had from the sheer volume of that weird music. The lighting was good at first (borderline too bright). The restaurant is more handicap accessible than normal for Italian standards. That is, if you can get yourself through that front door.

Once Seated: The decoration inside is actually very beautiful. However, this was quickly overshadowed because there was a dj playing music with the volume so high that I got PTSD to those Italian discos with underage children running around. I was quickly overstimulated with the obnoxious volume of the music coupled with all of the other patrons having to yell conversations. And those lights that were good? Once overwhelmed by the senses, they quickly became too freaking bright. A waiter came a few minutes after we were seated, but the menu was so large that a few minutes was not enough and we only ordered our drinks. However, the waiter never came back and we had to wait a really long time before we were able to flag someone down to take our order. The cups were slightly dirty.

Food: We ordered a Caesar salad, Greek salad, and shared a fried pizza.

2/5 Caesar Salad: This was not it. The croutons were soggy and cut way too large. Also the bread made up half of the dish. I enjoyed the parts of the salad that had lettuce. They put crispy bacon/pancetta on top but that ended up being too salty and overwhelming. Also there was too much dressing, but the dressing was very thick in consistency and almost jelly-like. The chunks of chicken were not good. Overall, I learned my lesson, do not get Caesar salad in Rome. It may have been created by an Italian outside of Italy and imitated all over the world, but good God. You would think that it could be done the same if not better in Italy, but it is not.

2/5 Greek Salad: Alittle better, but I still don’t understand why they couldn’t cut the tomatoes to be more bite sized? At some point, I felt bad because Paolo was eating quarters of a giant tomato. Also the serving bowls were terrible to eat out of because it was impossible to mix the salad with the dish being that full.

5/5 Fried Pizza: I will admit and give credit where it is due. I was craving montanara al pomodoro, and they only had tris di montanare, so we ordered something similar. This tasted like heaven when you consider that I had a terrible Caesar salad. There was just enough sauce and it was not too oily.

Service: Service was terrible and largely missing. The only time we really interacted with the servers was when we had to call for the waiter to take our order after about 20/25 minutes of just sitting there being passed. Also when it came time to pay, they had an issue with their credit card terminal and embarassed our friend asking if the card had money and worked etc. After asking and trying a few times they brought out a different credit card terminal and tried again not one apology was given. Actually in hindsight, the friend was asked multiple times if the card worked and it must have been either laziness to get a different terminal or a play to try and get our friend to pay cash. Unacceptable. Also the cups were dirty, but we couldn’t do anything about this because the servers were not present at all. There is no point in having staff wear ear pieces when everyone is just walking back and forth. The restaurant is understaffed and the workers are untrained for this scale of service.

Payment: I was paid for, so I don’t know the exact cost, but the Caesar salad was 14 euros and the Greek salad was 13. We were only able to have one bottle of frizzante for 3 euro, so it was roughly 40 euros more or less with my fried pizza and the cup charge. Overall, run for the hills and keep running. Pizzium is better, more peaceful, and arguably more aesthetically pleasing and clean (and you can read my review of Pizzium here https://nicoleinrome.com/2024/12/15/pizzium-roma-via-alessandria/). Their menu is also very fun with different regions of Italy being represented. However, they sadly don’t have that tris di montanare I keep raving about.