Roman osteria and amaro bar · €€€
On the ground floor of an eighteenth-century palazzo at the far end of Via di Ripetta, with tables outside looking at the Ara Pacis. The kitchen, under Daniele Roppo, lightens the Roman canon and keeps vegetarian plates on the card; the counter is what its own site calls Europe's first amaro bar, more than 600 Italian bitters. Its own site gives every day from 12:30 to 2am, kitchen until 11:30pm and aperitivo from 6:30pm to 9pm, which makes it the late answer nearest the hotel.
Reserve aheadVia di Ripetta 162
Wine shop with lunch kitchen · €€
A former coach-house, then a tavern, and a wine cellar since 1969, with marble-topped counters and iron chandeliers from the start of the last century still in place. Its own site says it has cooked lunch among the bottles since 1997 and dinner on Fridays and Saturdays only, so this is the midday stop: a glass, a plate of pasta, a bottle to carry home. No hours are published, so ring ahead if you are counting on a Friday or Saturday dinner.
Walk inVia di Ripetta 19
Roman trattoria, family since 1957 · €€
Founded in 1957 by a family from Amatrice, which explains the name and the amatriciana, and run since 1995 by Giacomo and Grazia Lo Bianco. It is the neighbourhood's proper Roman trattoria, in the lanes between Piazza San Lorenzo in Lucina and Via della Fontanella di Borghese. Its own site gives 12:30 to 3pm and 7:30 to 11pm, closed Sunday and from 7 to 27 August, and asks for bookings by phone or by email a day ahead; the room is small and full, so do.
Book well ahead: tables go weeks outVia del Leone 4
Pastificio Guerra
6 min walkTakeaway pasta counter, two dishes · €
A fresh-pasta shop off Piazza di Spagna that usually cooks two pastas a day and hands them over in a box to eat standing, or on a step outside, at a price that has nothing to do with the hotel. It has no website; its listings give 1pm to 9pm every day. Go for lunch on a shopping day, when the alternative around Via Condotti is a terrace with a photographed menu, and expect a queue at one.
Walk inVia della Croce 8
Emilian classic on the square · €€€
Three generations of the Tomaselli family and, by its own account, fifty years of Roman life, on Piazza del Popolo with tables outside. The cooking is Emilian rather than Roman: fresh pasta made in house, tagliatelle al ragù, tortellini in brodo and a trolley of boiled meats, the carrello dei bolliti, which its own site calls rare and much loved. The same site posts a dress code, which tells you the room it means to be. No hours are published; book.
Reserve aheadPiazza del Popolo 1
Enoteca's cellar restaurant, tasting menus · €€€€
A wine merchant since 1972, behind Parliament, whose owners turned the old cellars under the shop into a restaurant in 2010 and put more than 4,000 labels on the table at shop prices. Its own site gives tasting menus at 140 euros for five courses and 180 for eight, pairings from 100, a bistrot lunch at 10 to 28 euros a plate, and restaurant hours of Tuesday to Saturday, 12:30 to 3pm and 7:30 to 10:30pm. The same site describes a Michelin star regained in November 2024.
Book well ahead: tables go weeks outVia dei Prefetti 15
Contemporary Japanese in Palazzo Fendi · €€€€
The night off Italian food, on two floors of Palazzo Fendi with a bar and a terrace that its site says looks towards the Spanish Steps. The group's first Italian branch, sushi and robata counters on the fourth floor, and the group's prices. Its own site gives dinner 7pm to 11:30pm Monday to Saturday and to 11pm Sunday, the bar to 1am, or 2am on Fridays and Saturdays, and a Nomikai happy hour from 6pm to 7pm, listed as Saturday to Thursday in one line and every day in another.
Reserve aheadVia della Fontanella di Borghese 48
Breakfast is served at Il Caffè, indoors and under the arcade on the square; the hotel's own page lists it from 7am until 11pm. Whether it is included depends on the rate, so check what yours includes. If not, the hotel's own breakfast menu prices the set Italian breakfast at 45 euros a head, a cappuccino at 6 and eggs from 18, service included. For a counter cappuccino, Ciampini on Piazza San Lorenzo in Lucina is seven minutes away and, by its own site, open every day from 8am to 10pm.
The terrace tables on the square itself and the first stretch of Via del Corso and Via Tomacelli, where the menu has photographs and the pasta has a famous name attached. You would pay for the address twice, once upstairs and once at the table. Everything above is five to eight minutes in the other direction and costs less.
