Hi,
Since some of the Italian hotels that we are planning to stay at (Mar'05) didn't offer a sumptuos breakfast, I decided to opt for the non-breakfast rates.
Can experienced travelers to Italy share some ideas about fixing a good breakfast in the hotel room from purchases made from grocery stores?
I would also like to know what options we have to have a good breakfast at a cafe/ restaurant.
Any food ideas for the car (which we are renting for a week in Tuscany)?
Thanks

Sorry, I'm not understanding, because I would think, if you bought groceries at home and wanted to 'fix breakfast' in your home bedroom, what would you use? Breads, cheese, fruit, maybe a yogurt (if it was bought in the morning and didn't need refrigeration), and take-out coffee, I'm thinking.

from experience in rome, breakfast is, umm, difficult according to our standards. please define sumptuous(meaning eggs, sausage, etc) as i didn't see it . unless i was looking in the wrong area, i didn't see it. this time around at the places i'll stay, i'll opt for the breakfast...simplicity. now in paris, i'll get my own thank you very much.

No breakfast is served in restaurants in Italy.

You will find breakfast in an Italian café very disappointing: a coffee of some kind (there are a dozen variations) and a pastry similar to a French croissant or brioche. Italians generally take it standing; you can sit down, but the price will be higher than if you stand.

Your best bet for a "good breakfast" might be a McDonald's, but I'm not at all sure that the Egg McMuffin has made its way to Italy...

I could almost swear that I saw a cafe near Piazza Barberini offering an American breakfast with eggs.

As Elaine mentioned, if I don't have breakfast where I'm staying, I just go and get baked goods, cheese, fruit, and yogurt for breakfast, and then at some point during the morning get a cappucino. It does make a later start to the day, if you don't have a fridge to buy this the night before. So you could also just stick with the non-perishable food items and have an earlier lunch.

All of our hotels in Italy included a very filling breakfast buffet with a variety of choices. Since food is expensive in Italy, and we were travelling with the whole family, we felt this was a considerable savings. ARe you sure you don't want to change to hotels with breakfast? It also saves time to eat at your hotel's buffet. No waiting for tables, no waiting for the waitor, etc.

Good luck on this one, pg. As already stated, you will GENERALLY not find American style breakfasts (is that what you mean by "sumptuous"?) in Italy. Anything you can fix in your hotel would likely not be any better than the hotel would offer, and it is so much more convenient to just drop down to the breakfast room to grab a bite.

Just curious, how much did you save on the room charge by foregoing the breakfast?

--Marv

WillTravel, I believe you are right! Also, in Rome Babbington's Tea House has the "larger" selection of breakfast items one might see in an American restaurant, such as pancakes, although they may be called "buckwheat cakes". Frankly, the cornetto and cappucino are plenty for me in the morning.

Buon viaggio,
BC

My latest trip convinced me that I'd generally prefer a lower quality room with an excellent breakfast, than a high quality room with no breakfast, even though I can put together my own breakfast. It saved me so much time to have breakfast right there, it encouraged me to get up early, and I had a very cheerful start to the day, and was able to keep up a fast walking pace for the next six or seven hours.

It has been decades since I last set foot in Babington's Tea Room on Piazza di Spagna, but I would still be prepared to wager that for the price of a breakfast with "buckwheat cakes" there, I could have a very good lunch with wine at any of dozens of Roman restaurants.

aha, another hotel breakfast lover!
Me too!
I think we should form a support group, I always feel embarrassed when reading acounts from the hardier souls who get dressed in the a.m. and immediately leave the hotel in search of the best coffee and croissant/cornetto in the neighborhood. If I can get, if not the best, pretty good ones, and not have to leave the hotel in order to get them, I start the day happily.

I was responding to Willtravel

Elaine: I'm so sorry! I did not realize that I was not allowed to read a response to another poster in an open thread. My apologies!

Infotrack:
I didn't save more than 10-15 Euros on my hotel rooms - and BTW - I didn't take the breakfast option at ONLY those hotels that had poor breakfast reviews in Fodors/ Venere/ Tripadvisor etc. I would rather eat a heavy (hot?) breakfast with more choices than coffee, croissants, cold meat. Eating a good breakfast gives me an option to extend the morning exploration if I find something interesting.
I generally love the convenience of in-hotel breakfast, but have gotten to realize (from reading several posters) that the Italian hotels breakfasts are generally less generous than comparable hotels in other parts of Europe.

Eloise
I'm not sure what you're taking umbrage at, I was simply clarifying that, taken out of context, it might not be clear what my response about breakfast was referencing. What we write here is only in black and white, I don't know why you read a criticism into my clarification, but there was none intended and none stated.

Fine, PG, but WHERE are you going to find those hot, filling breakfasts?

They simply do not exist in Italy, because they are not now and never have been part of Italian culture.

The closest that you will come to what you are looking for is in the hotels that cater in large part to American tourists.

And how, in the name of all that's holy, do you expect to make a hot, filling breakfast in your room? It's simply not possible! You can bring in the cold things that some posters have mentioned, but would you not rather have a hotel breakfast that, at the very least, gives you a hot coffee, tea or chocolate?

Please do reconsider!

and now I am responding to pg

I disagree with your assessment of Italian hotel breakfasts. If you don't want them, that's fine, but I generally find them to be more generous than hotels in say, Paris, for one European example.
In Paris the most common offerings are a piece of baguette, a croissant, and coffee. More than that happens, but it is unusual imo.

In Italy I have most often been offered, in addition to the breads: meats, pastries, cheeses, yogurt, cereals,and fruit. Again, if that doesn't appeal, that's fine, but other than American or English-style breakfasts it will be hard to find more than those offerings in the mornings.

Elaine:
There have obviously been seriously mixed signals here.

I do not know why you responded to my message, which was a response to Bookchick's mention of Babington's, not to your message that you prefer to have breakfast in the hotel (as do I!) rather than looking for the nearest café.

My mistake was to conclude from your message that it had been you who had posted about Babington's; hence, my ironic reply.

This time, my quite sincere apologies. It's all been one of those mix-ups that can occur, as you say, when one is only going by black and white text.

Now, if we could only persuade PG that he is no more likely to find his hot, filling breakfast outside his hotel than in it, we shall have achieved something...

Elaine, I am being totally objective here. I honestly read your tone as being a tad bit harsh. Please forgive me if I am mistaken. Sometimes we can misread things which probabley is the case. I will give you the benefit of the doubt.

Yes Mrs Nelson, I see you registered under this name for the first time yesterday.
How about you don't give me any benefit of your doubts as I truly don't need them, and I won't give you any benefits of the doubts I have about you.

Eloise, it was just messages crossing each other in cyberspace.