Here is an account of our last formal meal in Florence. We spent the next day in Pisa, packing a lunch of sandwiches from the excellent Mercato di Sant’Ambrogio near our flat. And for dinner that last night we did takeaway pizza. I’ll have reports on both the market and the pizza later but here now is a look at our dinner at Adagio the evening prior.

Though not quite as close as Ghianda or our pizza destination the next evening, Adagio was located only a very short walk from our flat—something we appreciated after a long day of museuming. We also appreciated that it was quite well-cooled (as you know, it’s been a very hot summer in Italy). It’s an interestingly shaped restaurant, with tables set in a narrow hallway as you enter and about halfway through. At the very end it opens into a wider, regulation dining room. We were seated at one of the tables about halfway through, with lots of natural light streaming in through the skylights. The restaurant was fairly empty when we arrived, not too long after they opened, but filled up steadily as the evening went on. Having only eaten sandwiches for lunch (at Mercato Centrale), we were hungry and accordingly quickly got down to business.

Adagio’s regular menu is a compilation of classic and contemporary takes on Tuscan and Florentine cuisine. They also have a special, rotating, monthly tasting menu that focuses on cuisines of different parts of Italy. In June 2023 the focus was on Puglia. We were tempted by a few things on it but finally decided to stick with the regular menu. And everything we got from it ranged from the very good to the excellent. As always, we shared everything.

Things got off to a good start with a basket of very good bread and an amuse that was a puree of tomato and bread and other things. For our antipasti proper we got an order of their seafood crostini trio and their beef carpaccio. The crostini trio toppings included whipped bacala/salt cod, marinated anchovies, and salmon marinated with beets etc. All were very good, the anchovies were excellent. Also excellent was the lightly dressed carpaccio.

Three primi to follow. The cous cous alla Trapanese was recommended highly by our server and it was quite tasty with a goodly amount of seafood in the cous cous, and a spicy sauce alongside (spicy by Italian standards, that is; we barely registered any heat). Two pastas alongside: an excellent tagliolini tossed in a saffron cream sauce with zucchini flower and guanciale; and very good calamarata (a pasta shape that resembles rings/tubes of calamari) with asparagus and prawns in bisque.

For our secondi we went entirely to their grill. We got their grilled sirloin and their grilled octopus. Both were excellent, especially the octopus. I should note here that unlike in the US—or in Ireland, for that matter—when you order steak rare in Italy it actually comes out rare. The sirloin was cold in the middle. The steak being served very simply, we got a side of sauteed spinach to go with it and it was rather excellent as well.

To close, a piece of cheesecake to share. As you might be able to tell from the above, we were very full at this point. The cheesecake, served with jammy fruit (apricot, I think) was very good.

Two glasses of wine (rosé) rounded out our order. With the wine, the total came to just over 150 euros. Though more expensive than some of our other restaurant meals in Florence, Rome and Naples, this still seemed a very good value for what it was—especially when you compare it to the American context.

Service was a bit of a mixed bag. The servers were all very friendly and helpful but as the evening went on and the restaurant became more full, they became harder and harder to find and the gaps between courses began to stretch out quite a bit. It took a long time for us to be able to order dessert and quite a bit more time after that to get the check. But none of this came close to marring the evening. And if you hadn’t spent a hot day museuming, you might not even notice it.

Okay, just the two informal Florence reports left to go. I’m going to try to get one of those out this weekend and the other next week. The Italian meal reports will then move deeper into Tuscany before heading north. But I might start interspersing Dublin reports among them. Let’s see how it goes.