Florentine Dining: A Culinary Experience
In April, the University of St. Gallen has a two-week spring break. Some students use the time to travel, others spend it in the city catching up on work or doing block courses, and some go home. I used the opportunity to travel for about the first half, and came back early to get in a couple days of work.
To kick off the break, my first stop was meeting up with my boyfriend and his family in Florence, Italy. They had never been to Italy before, and I had never been to Florence, so it was an amazing new experience for all of us. What stuck out to us the most was how much of an experience the food was. Every restaurant we went to was amazing. In Italy, they book out the tables for the night, so basically they have one round of seating for the whole restaurant, and you can expect meals to last around four hours.
This was the case for our first meal, in La Giostra. This is a highly recommended and highly rated spot in Florence. Reservations must be made pretty far in advance, and for good reason. We arrived around 7pm and were seated in the back room with a view of the whole restaurant. What I liked so much about this restaurant was the sampling they offered. They had no problem bringing us samples of appetizers and even of pasta dishes, which were very generous servings for our group of 5. The servers were very friendly and laid back, ready to give us service when we needed it but allowing time for us to enjoy every bite. The meal ended up being almost 5 hours! My favorite dish was the carbonara from there, but there wasn’t a single bad thing I ate. The beef carpaccio was also unbelievable.
At all the restaurants in Italy they gave the table free items, whether it be free aperitivo, free
appetizers, free digestifs, etc. It was amazing! Another one of our favorite restaurants was La Buchetta. Not only did they offer these free foods as well, but they had a whole butcher shop attached to the restaurant,and the florentine steak there was unreal. The best part about the steak was that they would show you what you’re getting before they cook it! It’s that fresh they cut it and bring it out to you with a scale. As you can see from the picture, we had a MASSIVE Florentine steak that night, and I’m not ashamed to say we ate the entire thing. Overall takeaway: Italian dining is a MUST. Florentine stake included.
Bis zum nächsten mal!
Kara