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michellemaphoto · 6 years

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Rome, Italy

Hello there! I was in Italy in mid-summer, but as life took over since then, I’ve only had a chance to write about it now that I have a bit of downtime around the holidays.

Italy was a magical trip, not least because I had such a wonderful host and ample time on my hands to explore and wander. For those who have never been to Rome, it’s an amazing city to wander in, and I savored every minute of it. From wandering the streets, finding historical sites every few blocks, coffee shops, restaurants, and boutiques, there is always something interesting around the corner for me to discover and think about. Below are the highlights and more photos here. Enjoy!

Where I Stayed

I don’t have any photos of this place as I didn’t much like it, but I stayed at the Beehive Hostel, at the Clover offsite apartment house so I could have my own home. It’s only a few blocks from Termini station, but the off site apartment wasn’t in the best part of town and was definitely sketchy at night. While the interior was clean, it was little more than a place to sleep and shower, and wasn’t a place I felt like I could chill in. The guest turnaround was also what you’d expect from a hostel. Some were polite and friendly, some were rude and noisy, and others in-between. Overall, I would have had a better experience if I stayed on-site, but there weren’t any openings for the time of year I went, and I needed to be reasonably close to my friend and a subway station, plus I had budgeted more money into eating and shopping, so my options were indeed limited. It wasn’t the most expensive place to stay in, but I was happy to be out and stay with Alexandra in her beautiful art-deco home for the remainder of my time in Rome.

Food

Ain’t a Rome post without writings on food. Rome was full of fresh and affordable food so I didn’t feel the urge to have fancy dinners here. The best part about food in Italy is that it’s high quality, portioned well (neither too much nor too little, and never stingy), and affordable for students and working people alike. Food equality! I can’t emphasize enough the quality of ingredients and attention to the enjoyment of food. None of the food I had made me sleepy, sick, or otherwise feel horrible, which often happens in the US if I indulge in starch and sweets. And the passion people put in their food prep translates into an otherworldly experience when I take my first few bites, until the very end of my meal. An entire country that loves food as much as, but likely more than, I do, and that makes all my favorite food beautifully. I’LL BE BACK!

Breakfast Food

For breakfast, I often had an espresso drink, either straight espresso, macchiato, or cappuccino, and perhaps with a pastry, such as a cornetto or chocolate croissant, when I was feeling more peckish. It’s usually what Italians eat for breakfast, and I don’t eat a lot of breakfast normally anyway, so it suited me well. Usually it’s 1 euro each for a drink and a pastry. I can’t imagine getting this level of quality and experience in the Bay Area for even 3x that price. Bay Area’s gotta step it up!

1. Cambridge Cafe

Cambridge Cafe was in a beautiful, more suburban part of town whose architecture was reminiscent of some neighborhoods in Paris. I loved the morning bustle here but it wasn’t touristy at all, which I much enjoyed. The coffee and pastries were also delicious!

I went here quite a few times for the delicious coffee and variety of pastries. The chocolate croissant was fresh and still had molten chocolate inside.

2. Mizzica

This gem of a bakery serves Sicilian pastries and it was absolutely wondrous to look at the displays while I waited in line. I got a small pistachio cannolo and a chocolate pastry that resembled a donut (dunno what it’s called, sorry!). Both were incredible and I savored every last crumb. The cannoli in Italy are a different item completely from the starchy mess I’ve had in the US. It’s definitely worth a try from a genuine Sicilian bakery.

I made a real mess eating this. No regrets.

3. Mercato Centrale

Mercato Centrale is a food court that is connected to Termini Station above ground. But, calling it a food court is really a disservice because I have never seen any food court like this back in the US. Perhaps it’s a bit like the higher end food courts I found in the fancy department stores in Japan, but this definitely had its own flavor and personality. It’s open early and closes late, which is perfect for commuters and travelers alike, and serves a variety of foods, ranging from breakfast and pastries to coffee, wines, other drinks, and prepared foods such as pasta, sandwiches, and desserts. It also features a meat market and pasta market, so there’s plenty to see here.

I went here a couple times as well since it was at the train station nearest my hostel and served such delicious food I knew I could count on it in times of hangriness. The mercato here also serves coffee and pastries and I went here on one of my first days in Rome to try a couple items. I got a cappuccino and cornetto speciale (which has chocolate swirls in the crust), and had a bit of heaven.

Lunch

There are so many lunch options in Rome it’s hard to list out all the choices I had, but I’ll list the highlights below. Any form of starch you want, you got it! Pasta, pizza, sandwiches, salads, and so much else, that I’d have to live here at least a few years to go into detail what the city has to offer. Here are my humble meals.

1. Mercato Centrale

Ok, I went here a bunch of times because of its convenience, quality, and sheer variety of food to eat. It also was smartly situated at my subway stop and was a great option after sightseeing all morning and needed to rest my feet before going back to the hostel. My first meal in Rome with my friend was actually here, where I had pasta with cacio e pepe. DELICIOUS. Blew my mind. No cacio e pepe in the US ever tasted like this. Actually, except for Pizzaiolo and Pazzo, no Italian restaurant in the US that I have tried has gotten even close to any pasta I’ve had in Rome. They just can’t touch this. And all this for about 8 euros! I was in heaven.

Cacio e pepe

Pesto pasta

Ravioli

2. Il Sorpasso

This place is great for a lunch or dinner and has a fun, busy vibe that’s great for meeting up with friends, and romantic enough for dinner. For lunch, I went by myself at at at the bar, starting first with a coffee, prosciutto, and having a potato tortino with vegetables. Delicious! If only there was a menu in English, as I’d actually been looking for a pasta with red sauce. So it goes. I also ordered too much, as you can probably guess. I was hungry. Just finish your food, kids, or you’ll get a disapproving look from the serving staff. SIGH.

3. Baccanale

Baccanale isn’t far from Piazza Navona or Campo d’Fiori, so it was a good stop for lunch while sightseeing that day. The sandwich options were also tasty and it was fun to walk around and see the sights while munching on a sandwich of salami and cheese.

Dinner

1. Ristorante Pecorino

This restaurant served incredible carbonara. Although, tbh, I about died at every meal because everything that I tried was so good. This place still blew everything away. It’s quite a bit pricier than the other places I listed above, but it’s well worth the money. There is even an additional level of refinement here in ambiance and food preparation that is worth every extra euro I paid for my meal. I ate with my friend Alexandra, first sharing a fried artichoke appetizer and digging into my carbonara, before finishing off the meal with a zabaione and amaro del capo. It was a dinner I won’t forget, and inspired me to make carbonara at home and search for quality guanciale. The search, sadly, continues, but the memory lives on.

The food was so good I even braved the cultural disapproval and exasperation in asking for a box to go so I could eat it for breakfast. No shame!

2. Il Sorpasso

Il Sorpasso was also a delicious place, and was completely different at night, with the darker dining area and candlelit meals. It’s a great place for a date or a nice night out with good friends, and I really enjoyed my meal here. We started with some bread and cheese, and I ordered a glass of red wine to go with my pasta.

3. L’antica Pizzeria Da Michele

This place is my pizza soulmate. It’s also incredibly busy so we went at 7:30 for dinner, which is early here, but perfect timing for me, which ended in a 10 minute wait (hooray!) For the two times I went here, I ordered local craft beer, which paired excellently with my Neapolitana and Margherita pizzas. Thin crust, baked at incredibly high temps for a short period of time, just enough to blister the crust and make it crunchy on the outside, while leaving the inside doughy and pleasantly chewy. When I go back to Rome, this will be one of my first stops after I dump my shit at the hotel. Yep.

4. Alice Pizza

Alice Pizza is Roman style pizza, and this place sells pizza by the kilo, so you can tell the server to cut as much as you’d like off the sheet of pizza on display. No shame. I loved the slightly thicker crust here, square slices, and the still-chewy dough. The Italians don’t take any shortcuts when it comes to their yeast bread, that’s for sure.

I had this once at the actual restaurant and once at a house party, and both times the pizza was delicious and satisfying to the soul. Very different from the Neapolitan pizza, but no less satisfying. I had mushrooms and margherita, the slices were substantial.

5. Ops!

One evening, we felt like having something simple, so opted to go to Ops! for dinner, where food is purchased buffet style and weighed at the cashier. It was a simple arrangement and the food was delicious. No complaints here.

Other grocery stores

The grocery stores here were also to die for. I loved to wander the aisles and see what each shop had to offer, whether it was an incredible wine selection, chocolate section, or lots of fresh fruit. Some of the best grocery stores were small family-owned ones selling the most incredibly fresh fruit I have ever seen. I purchased a kilo of cherries for less than 3 euros, and it was a varietal I can’t find in the states. Sweet with nuance, crispy, juicy, fleshy, and better than anything people describe as fruit that tastes like candy. The bigger grocery stores that had prepared food sold a mouth-watering variety of fresh baked bread, burratta cheese and other cheeses, and cured meats, such as salami and prosciutto. These places are great when going on a picnic, and we stopped by on our way to a picnic at Villa Borghese with another friend living in Rome.

Gelato

I’m not allowed to skip this section. Mostly because I had gelato nearly every day... Yep. It was that good. And there are that many places to try. And every place serves 2 scoops of gelato of your choice, fills the bottom of your cone (and you had better get a cone, you noob) with molten milk or white chocolate, and even gives you fresh whipped cream or a cookie on top, depending on the place, for no extra charge. All under 3 euros. So eat your heart out. I certainly did, and I had no shame in walking a bit extra instead of buying another subway pass just so I could have those minutes of anticipation and bliss. So do it. You won’t regret this. Especially in a fucking June-July heat wave.

The gelato I had at these places (and everywhere else I went) had incredibly fresh gelato, often made with organic ingredients. You could taste the chocolate, the fruit, and all the quality ingredients and love that went into each scoop. You can see the attention with which each server scoops and shapes the gelato by hand (with such flair!) onto the cone so that it’s the perfect soft-serve consistency from the first bite, or fills the cone with molten chocolate, or adds the little cookie on top. The love and attention to detail are everywhere, AS LONG AS YOU AVOID THE TOURIST TRAPS. Not only are the tourist traps more expensive, the ingredients are cheap and they might even use food coloring for how strangely some of the gelato looked coming out of those shops. Just don’t do it. Walk those extra blocks and try these places, or I’ll scorn you forever. And get the regular size -- two scoops, on a cone. Don’t try to cheap out or count calories with one cone or ask for a damn cup. Or you’ll endure the hatred of literally everyone in Italy. Eat this proper.

1. Guttilla

This was my favorite gelato place of all I tried in Rome. The gelato was better than La Romana, the cone was slightly sweet, pleasantly crunchy on the outside with a tiny but of doughyness on the tongue on the inside, and the fruit berry gelato flavor was to die for. I went here at least a couple times. I’d learn Italian just so I could order food.

I didn’t have time to check out all the other goodies on offer here, but I’ll come back for you!

Whimsy and art taken to a fanatical level. YES. You are my people.

2. Gelateria La Romana

The whipped cream at this place trumps the whipped cream I had at any other gelato place in Italy, period. While Guttilla had better gelato, the whipped cream here is worth the trip alone. Don’t get me wrong, the gelato is still top notch and I’m splitting hairs here. Try this too!

And try these and tell me what they’re like! They look heavenly.

Sightseeing

I sprinkled all the eating in between sightseeing, so I’d advise travelers to map out what sights are close to each other and in what neighborhoods, and then do research on places to eat nearby. Rome required a TON of walking, about as much as Tokyo did, so I had to prepare for transit time and good shoes. Not to mention being hungry after a couple hour-long outing.

I organized my sightseeing highlights in order of my favs (Vatican City and Museum of Modern Art being my top picks if you only have 24-48 hours in Rome), and the rest are grouped by vicinity, for ease of planning. Hope this helps!

1. Vatican City

The Vatican was my favorite sight in all of Rome, to my surprise. I’m neither very knowledgeable about the history of the Vatican nor Catholic, but the museum had a collection of breathtaking structures and pieces of art that I was in awe my entire time here. My favorite gallery was the Gallery of Cartography of Italy, since I love looking at maps and the ornate ceiling was captivating.

The Sistine Chapel (no photos allowed) was beautiful as well, and well worth the crowds and the pushy people, but after seeing all the beauty around me on the rest of the tour, it wasn’t my main highlight.

My favorite at the Vatican was, of course, St. Peter’s Basilica. The architecture, art and sculpture, history and overall feel of being inside and having a quiet moment is something special which I can’t describe in words. It was a comforting and awe-inspiring place to be, and I’m lucky to have been able to visit and drink in all the beauty and history.

No visit to St. Peter’s is complete without a climb up the cupola, or dome, for an extra few euros.The climb up is long and stuffy, and the crowds can be unbearable at times, but the view of the rest of the Vatican looking down, and the rest of Rome, is truly worth the struggle. And with the crowds that day and the intense heat, it was one of those days where I wanted a nap and gelato after.

Also, after seeing the museums and St. Peter’s during the day, it was quite a nice change to come back at night later in my trip to see the Vatican lit up at night, with quiet streets and no crowds.

2. National Gallery of Modern Art

The National Gallery of Modern Art was a close second when it came to favorite sites. It contains art (paintings, sculpture, other installations) from the 19th and 20th centuries and has the largest modern art collection in all of Italy. Many of the pieces were striking in their simplicity and use of color and lines, and others were more whimsical. It was a great way to spend an afternoon, indoors and away from the heat. Not only are the museum grounds beautiful, but the walk through the museum was incredibly well-planned and the items on exhibit carefully curated. So, while the museum was one of the smaller ones I visited when in Italy, every piece made me pause in thought. I’m also a modern art lover, so this was an ideal place to visit! It’s accessible by tram and is pretty easy to get to. Favorite art pieces below!

3. Colosseum

I saw the Colosseum, Roman Forum, Trajan’s Column, and Vittoriano in one trip as they’re all walking distance from each other, and off the Colosseo subway stop. I actually visited the Roman Forum, Trajan’s Column, and Vittoriano a few times while walking by and wandering the city, so I was able to capture the Forum and Vittoriano during the day and at night.

I learned some really neat facts about the Colosseum while walking on the grounds. It required a ticket to get in, and took about an hour to an hour and a half to walk through different parts of the structure and through the museum. It was breathtaking not only by its sheer size, condition of the surviving structure, and also with the knowledge that the entire thing was build without modern tools. To add on top of that, the stadium seating and entrances and exits were designed so that the a full stadium of people could completely exit the Colosseum in only a few minutes. I don’t know if even modern stadium can accomplish that. Apparently, the Colosseum also had become a jungle as it grew over and fell into disuse, and in the Middle Ages, was inhabited by people who partitioned off parts into homes and workshops. What a history!

4. The Roman Forum

The Roman Forum was also a sight to see. Sunken below street level, the walkway we walked on was the same sidewalk the Romans used thousands of years ago. I pictured the marketplaces, places of worship (temples and churches), and even Caesar’s funeral pyre as I walked around the Roman Forum, admiring the beautiful marble pillars still standing and the ornate carving on them.

5. Trajan’s Column

North of the Roman Forum and across the street, Trajan’s Column was built in AD 113 or so, and celebrated Emperor Trajan’s victory in the Dacian Wars. The spiral bas relief was something to see, thousands of years later.

6. Vittoriano

The Vittoriano was built in the 19th century to honor Italy’s first king, and was even more beautiful at night.

7. Pizza Navona

I visited Piazza Navona, the Trevi Fountain, Campo d’Fiori, and Pantheon in a walking tour one day, which took the better part of the late morning and afternoon, counting a couple times when I took a wrong turn, and also when I stopped to browse some boutiques. The Piazza Navona was actually my favorite spot of all of these four, followed closely by the Pantheon. Surprisingly, I wasn’t as interested in the Trevi Fountain, despite all the talk it gets.

Fountain of the Four Rivers, with an Egyptian obelisk.

8. Trevi Fountain

The Trevi Fountain, in the district of Trevi, is the largest baroque fountain in Rome. Even though it was stunning and beautiful, I much preferred Piazza Navona and the fountain there.

9. Campo d’Fiori

Campo d’Fiori, south of Piazza Navona, was a square with an outdoor market, comprised mostly of touristy souvenirs, and crowded as all hell. I walked around quickly and then wandered to Baccanale for lunch, barely a block or so away.

10. Pantheon

The Pantheon was something else. Another structure whose sheer scale and grandeur, not to mention condition, the Pantheon was well worth the horrible crowds, just so I could go inside and look up in amazement at the beauty around me. Sadly, my humble 50mm could not capture all I could see.

11. Largo di Torre Argentina

I couldn’t visit the site of Caesar’s funeral pyre at the Roman Forum and not go to Largo di Torre Argentina, the site where he was murdered.

11. Villa Borghese

I didn’t walk through all of Villa Borghese, as it’s huge, but the gardens are beautiful, tranquil, and the perfect spot for some morning exercises or an afternoon picnic. I opted for the latter with a couple friends and enjoyed a leisurely meal in the shade of a large tree.

12. Monti neighborhood

On my first day in Rome, Alexandra took me for a nice after lunch stroll through Monti, a picturesque and popular neighborhood, where I could start to soak in the architecture, coffee, and gelato.

13. Romeow Cat Cafe

I had to go here. I mean, I went to Tokyo just to see 20 cats eating in a row at the MoCHA Cat Cafe in Shibuya. Rome has one cat cafe, and I had to see what the Italian kitties were like. The cafe served delicious smoothies and had a coffee shop / lounge feel that was great for conversation and for searching for kitties to pet. It was really fun and low-key, and quite different from the Tokyo experience, which felt more structured.

The Cat Cafe is in the Testaccio neighborhood, so I had a chance to wander through the area, admire Pyramide, and head to Ristorante Pecorino for lunch after.

Shopping

No post about Rome is complete without a list of places to go shopping or browse:

Intimissimi: for pajamas and underwear, and all other pretty things

Flavio Castellani: for high end boutique clothing made in Italy. It’s high quality here, with the flair of something you can only get in Italy, but without the ghastly price tag of Gucci. Do check it out, even if you don’t buy!

And, if you do go shopping, ask about getting VAT refunds, and get to the airport early to cash out at a Global Blue kiosk. Don’t be those asshole tourists who try to cut in line, 10 at a time, so they can get their money back AND make their flight back. They got yelled at. No sympathy!

Go to Rome! Also, go to Florence! I’ll be writing about it soon :)

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