Also hope that whoever writes about a place isn't so against it that they'll attack anything postive about it.

But that should be fairly easy, as I haven't seen anyone here who has either defended or attacked ANYTHING about it.

There are two restaurants south of florence and just south of Greve that are out of the way with fantastic food and exceptional scenery.

Restaurant di Lamole in a teeny town with unbelievable views of the countryside.

On the same road, and before you get to Lamole, there is Aia dei Canti inside the Castle di lamole. Its a teeny hamlet of a few buildings. Two of our best meals were at these restaurants.


http://www.ristorodilamole.it/

Thank you all for so many wonderful suggestions!

Barb

Rufus,

I spend more time talking about the treasures of Venice than a lot of people, who seem to think it's a place to go eat gelato.

ttt

nessundorma, no, I don't know Do Farai, but if it is the trattoria that you were referring to recently in another thread, where the owner would sit down and chat with the guests, I'm curious to try it next time when being in Venice.
If anybody got me wrong, I didn't want to say that there is no good food in Venice - I'm the first to preach that yes there is if you are doing sufficient research. But it is certainly true that it is difficult to discover any "hidden" places; furthermore that the average quality is much, much lower than in most other Italian cities/regions. (And for that, tourism is to blame - the cuisine of Venice is better than one might think, but there are no restaurants serving most of the interesting dishes! We might better talk about hidden dishes, thus, than about hidden restaurants :) To get an impression of what the cuisine of Venice boasts, just chat a little with the vendors on the fish market!)
As far as Mestre, I wouldn't exactly recommend it for reasonable prices (that would mean going a little - but really just a little! - farther from Venice: e.g. to Dolo on the Brenta canal, or to Villa Condulmer in Mogliano Veneto: http://www.hotelvillacondulmer.com/ - yes, incredible but true, a luxury hotel in a baroque villa, and the restaurant is excellent and has REALLY reasonable prices, given the more than elegant setting and service). But as for Mestre, the point in going there is that on the outskirts of Mestre, you'll find the best fish restaurant where I've ever been: Il Cason, http://www.alcason.it The reason why I'm recommending it, however, is nothing about the prices... but the food is IN-CRE-DI-BLY good.
nessundorma, if you like bigoli in salsa (that's what you were talking about, whole weat pasta with anchovy sauce), you MUST go to La Botte next time when coming to Venice. They're serving the best bigoli in salsa on this planet: http://www.osteriaallabotte.it Hard to find, but absolutely worth searching (and the best food in Venice, anyhow, not only the best bigoli in salsa). However, no hidden place (though hidden, yes, as a location... just a few metres from Ponte di Rialto, but you'll take five wrong lanes before catching the proper one), rather, already on several guidebooks from all over the world.

Thank you franco, I'm bookmarking both those restaurants for my return to Venice. Hope you enjoy the atmosphere at Do Farai in the Dorsoduro, and that the food is good that night. Say hi to Stefano. ;-)

I feel badly that I got into a tiff with Rufus, but he might understand my tiff-i-ness better if he imagined what his own reaction might be if, after describing his reactions to Korean food, the response was to talk about people who apparently expect anything eaten with chopsticks to be drowned in soy sauce and come with a fortune cookie at the end.

I don't disbelieve people who tell me they had a highly enjoyable meal in Venice. They ate it. I didn't. But they shouldn't assume others who encountered surprisingly mediocre and even bad food in Venice were being careless or are unschooled eaters. One gets so used to eating well in Italy without a lot of planning or money, Venezia is a bit of an anomaly.

Hey -- Osteria alla Botte is in San Marco!

;-)

Yes, the S. Marco district goes as far as Rialto bridge, and in fact, the bridge, too, belongs to S. Marco. La Botte is just a few steps off Campo S. Bartolomeo (Bortolomio, as the locals would say), that's the one with the Goldoni monument from where to ascend ponte di Rialto.

Franco: It is truly wonderful to read these tips from you since you know the city so well. If I may ask, where do you live now? I will surely put your recommendations at the top of my list for the next time I am fortunate enough to visit Venice and the surrounding area. I am also glad to hear you recommend Osteria alla Botte; I visited there several times during my last trip and thought the place was very friendly with excellent food. For this reason, I was surprised to read some negative comments about it a while ago on this board. I am sure I speak for many when I say we are very glad that you have decided to spend some time with us here at Fodor's.

ekscrunchy,

You certainly speak for me....

ek and Traviata, thank you so much for your overwhelming kindness - which makes it very difficult for me not to answer your question, ek. I beg you to understand, however, that I absolutely want to be anonymous, including the place where I live now; it has to do with a certain prominence in a certain country, with having deliberately disappeared from public life there, and with a (quite probably paranoid) fear of the yellow press. Honestly, I don't suppose they're reading any threads at Fodor's, but hell if they ever did, and if they'd recognize me, it would be too high a price for my presence here, as much as I enjoy it. I'm sorry...
But let's return to this thread's topic - hidden restaurants! Rome, this time. Osteria dell'Angelo might well be considered a "hidden" place; you might check this thread: http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...;tid=34757496; in my first entry there, I've written more about it. Another hidden place near Rome is Osteria al Monumento in Ostia Antica, an excellent, simple trattoria specializing in fish dishes (which is rare in Rome itself - Rome is 30 kilometres or so away from the sea, and that's already "inland" for an Italian; the Roman cuisine has hardly any fish dishes! Ostia Antica, however, is about 20 kilometres nearer to the coast, and there you find them... just to give a little lecture about necessary freshness of fish, as opposed to all those scallop-lobster-turbot dishes 1500 kilometres above sea level, or several hundred miles inland).
Btw, if anyone is interested in cooking him/herself while on a holiday (fun for many who are renting apartments), we could well make a follow-up on "hidden" dishes of the cuisine of Venice; maybe not exactly here, in order not to disturb Barbbroom's thread further and further...

franco,

Whatever it takes is whatever it takes...just don't stop posting on Fodor's!! I left you a note on "solo Venice" that says it for me...

Greatest little restaurant recommended by the staff at the Rome Gea di Vulcana hotel, is called Trattoria Abruzzese at via Napoli 4 (not far from the Termini station). What a great little downstairs place - I couldn't understand how they made those wonderful raviolis - but I recommend it to anyone looking for something local, and absolutely delicious. Bon Appetit.

Thank you, Traviata. Don't worry, though I can't make promises for the entire rest of my life, I have absolutely no intentions so far to stop posting here...

Gatto Nero on the island of Burano in Venice. The freshest seafood around. You can usually spot the Missonis dining here if they are in town.

Yes, surprising as it is (on an island as heavily touristed as Burano), this seems to be a really good restaurant. It's definitely on my check list for one of the next visits to Venice: I know a man who is living on a very small island in the northern laguna (no tourists there) and who used to work as a fisherman in his youth - so he should know about fish! (Until today, he wouldn't eat a clam that he didn't bring up from the muddy ground of the laguna with his own hand.) And he, too, swears that Gatto nero is the best fish restaurant around. Though, he adds, it's very expensive... well, Burano tourism can't be without ANY effect, I guess.

I'm no help but wanted to say hello to Polly Magoo.

Hi, Mimi. I am like a cat: I have nine lives!!!!! It is not that easy to get rid of me.

Your friend,
Daughter of Dior

I know everyone is off this thread by now.Thank you for the restaurants.We will be in Venice for three nights and 4 days in August.We arrive in the evening around 9 and I know that is late.The hotel suggested that we go to Do Farai or Aqua Pazza for the first night.After Venice we will be in Milan..Any Great restaurants there? I'll have to do a search .........