dscan99

Our tickets are booked for Thanksgiving!!!! My husband and I are super excited about our first ever trip to Europe.. and we picked Italy.

I would love to hear suggestions for vegetarian friendly restaurants and cafes in Rome and Florence. We will also be celebrating our 5th wedding anniversary in Rome, so a special restaurant will be nice for the occassion.

We eat dairy... just no chicken, seafood or meat. Thank you.

-DS

mamcalice

You should be able to get vegetarian food in most any restaurant in Italy. Just look at salads and pastas on the menu. And most restaurants have menus posted. Do a search on this board for Rome and Florence restaurants.

Zerlina

In Rome, Margutta Vegetariano is central (not far from the Spanish Steps) and has a lunch buffet. Arancia Blu is vegetarian and *not* central: Via Prenestina 360.

But Mamcalice is right: every restaurant has vegetarian options on the menu, listed in the primi and contorni sections.

zeppole

I prefer eating vegetables, and don't find restaurants in Italy helpful at all in that regard. One rarely finds interesting salads on the menu, and vegetarian "primi" and "contorni" options can often be monotonous, or in the case of the contorni, downright pathetic. In addition, some plates one might assume to be vegetarian (mushroom pastas, stuffed vegetables, etc) often have meats or anchovies in the recipe, so it is a problem for strict vegetarians.

If you want a menu with varied and interesting vegetarian food, including the chance to eat an entree, no just appetizers and pasta, with no trace of meat or fish, it helps to plan in advance.

In addition to the usual Happy Cow listings, this link might help you out a lot:

http://www.viverevegan.org/ristoranti.html

In addition to Il Margutta in Rome, there is Arancia Blu

http://www.aranciabluroma.com/

http://www.ilmarguttavegetariano.it/

For Florence, this link might be of help

http://www.veggieplaces.co.uk/vegeta...ence_pisa.html

tarquin

You need to go to Venice, zeppole. I am not veggie but love vegetables and finally got to La Zucca this month. We ordered far too much in our enthusiasm - top dish for me was the sformatino di melanzane e ricotta.

zeppole

tarquin,

There are many marvelous vegetarian restaurants all over Italy (La Zucca started out as one, and only later expanded the menu). But what is typical of Italy is that they are quite few and far between, and in any city you go to, you may have only a choice of one or two restaurants using vegetables to make marvelous, complete meals.

No need to go to Venice because were luckier in Liguria to have several pastas with pounded nut sauces, plus no pizza but a pie made of chickpeas, and stuffed vegetables dishes, bean soups and vegetable pies. dscan99 are only going to Rome and Florence -- and even if they were going to Venice, they would need to do some real research if they wanted full vegetarian meals in restaurants. At best, they will find some scattered pasta and bean dishes, maybe the occasional egg entree, in an otherwise all-meat menu.

I get the impression that quite a few people who are not vegetable-centered in their eating look at a menu in Italy and conclude that other people who are vegetable-centered will find plenty to enjoy given the cheesy pasta plus a handful of standard vegetable sides like spinach or boiled potatoes. But a lot of vegetarians don't want a constant diet of carbs, cheese and plain vegetables.

Much regional cooking in Italy historically was based on lentils and other benas, chickpeas, all sorts of nuts, and dishes where eggplant or other robust vegetables were the centerpiece of the meal (not a "side"). In Calabria, they even make a chocolate dessert with eggplant. In Venice, rice and peas were a dietary staple, and now you almost never see them on menus.

dscan99

Thank you all.

We really enjoy pastas, raviolis, pizzas and good wine. I'm hoping we wont have too much of an issue with food in our travels. I do agree that a bit of reasearch will help a lot.