who doesn't love italian? i think everyone does. so i was pretty excited to be in the country that serves awesome food, or so i thought. in fairness to italy, rome isn't really the culinary capital. but i never expected food to be really mediocre. come on! this is italy and family owned restaurants should be one of those awesome finds.
i've done my research on the "best" eats in rome. ristorante santi was one of the forerunners because it was soooo near our hotel plus the food is relatively affordable plus people had good reviews about the place. these are the food items we tried during our several visits.
carbonara - it's rome's signature pasta dish. i only got to try it once and it was a bad version. the eggs were curdling, it wasn't creamy at all. only a faint taste of guanciale if they used guanciale at all or maybe they just used pancetta. authentic carbonara should use guanciale, cured pork cheeks while pancetta is the italian bacon. the plate was huge this can feed 2 people i didn't finish it.
lasagna - decent enough
seafood risotto - my parents said it was too buttery but i didn't find it as such. i thought risotto is supposed to be this creamy rice dish yeah i know this version doesn't have cheese! but the method of cooking risotto should yield a creamy porridgy consistency because of the starch in the rice meshed well with the broth!
arrabiata - nothing special
grilled seabass - i liked the idea of using garlic and parsley to stuff a fish. but nothing really special and the sides are just really sad.
dessert - this was like a crema catalan, i forgot the actual name. so not worth the calories.
lemon sorbet - to cleanse the palate
there were other items i forgot to take pictures of. i still cannot fathom the awesome reviews this place had. the food is so so, yes cheap/affordable by rome standards but seriously? there was a night we just opted to eat at chicken hut instead of going back to this place. the service is so so, even during our visits when it wasn't busy at all. sets are around 10 euros and that's cheap by eu standards.
ristorante santi
via daniele manin
off via principe amedeo
parallel to via cavour near termini station
