While I have yet to experience dining inside we chose to eat her 4 times during out short stay in…read morePoliagno! The fresh seafood was such a nice compliment to all the pasta and pizza. While you really can't go wrong with anything on the menu- I highly recommend grabbing a sandwich with fresh burrata! You can order online for pick up if you don't want to stand in line but make sure you plan ahead- all the food is made with care. It's also open from 12-12 making it a popular spot for most of the lunch, dinner and late night crowd. Do not miss this on your visit!

This seafood joint is worth the line. Italian-born, but soon opening an NYC location, I loved the 4…read moremeals I got at Pescaria. Highlights: 1) Definitely the pulpo sandwich. 2) Next is the tuna panini. 3) Then the salmon panini. The crudo options are delish. If you've never had a raw shrimp, now's your chance to try some freshyyy ones. The salads are also delightful and the polpette's are MUAH. I ate here so many times and I'm glad I got to check out their menu...didn't try any of the pasta dishes, but the fish here is fresh, delicious, and decently priced. Pro-tip: Go online and order about 2 hours before you're hungry esp in peak season so that you can just skip the line and pick it up. Otherwise, it's like an hour+ ordeal at times to grab food here.

Beautiful restaurant with stone arches and ceilings…read more We did the tasting menu. Which was excellent. The tuna tartare was so fresh. The rice and mussels were tasty, however the mussels were tiny. We shared 3 pasta dishes, I really liked the pasta and prawns. We all had the fish special which is cooked with olive oil, zucchini and potatoes and olives. Yumm We were so full that we took dessert home. The service is very good. I highly recommend this restaurant.

We are staying at the Grotta Palazzese, which is the highest end hotel of the region with two…read morereputedly fabulous restaurants. However, other than our breakfasts at the hotel, which we paid to have included with our rooms, we are not likely having dinners here. While their menus will astound many, as well as the views of the caves, which is why many come to dine and visit, we have been seeking less extravagant dinners while here, given our suite is over $1,500 a night at the present Euro conversion. So we consulted YELP for the best rated restaurants in town and that led us here. It was all 4 and 5 ratings, save for a single rating of 1, which was based on a disgruntled patron who never even ate here. They just were declined at the door - due to no reservations, which are recommended - in a manner they deemed obnoxious. It's easy to see why so many though rated this a 5. However, we felt it fell just short in some respects that brought it down to a 4. That said, we are sure many will enjoy a 5 experience. We had a few glasses of local primovito by the glass, which like most places we've dined in Puglia was absurdly reasonable by our local NYC metro area standards. These were poured after complimentary glasses of Prosecco and a lovely small potato soup. We ordered the house special antipasto, which were 5 different small seafood dishes (baked scallops, fried cod, mussels with rice, potatoes, and tomatoes, octopus salad, and yellowfin tuna tartare). This is a must have introduction to any meal. My wife then had one of the catches of the day offerings and I the half lobster with tagliatelle. It's an all seafood restaurant, so if you are looking for something other than that, you'll need to look elsewhere. However, if seafood is your thing, of which there is quite a lot in this town, this restaurant deserves your patronage.

One of my favorite meals in Italy! Excellent service, delicious food (octopus appetizer, seafood…read morepasta, and tiramisu) finished with a selection of chocolates. Loved seeing the fresh fish options, and they have several olive oils to choose from to go with the amazing bread basket (they also sell the olive oils) . I felt so welcomed there, like they were really glad to have me as a patron that evening. I chatted with the manager and the server, and was delighted to be gifted bottle of oil at the end of the meal. Thank you for a wonderful evening!

What an absolute gem of a place! Phenomenal service, amazing food, fantastic wine! Truly, this…read moreplace is impeccable!

Simply fantastic! We had amazing 'primi' (orichiette ao sugo for my 3 year old, seafood pasta and…read morezucchini with gamberi (shrimp) pasta for the grown ups). We were amazed at the quality of the dishes and the very reasonable portion sizes. Prices were also competitive ($10-13 euros each). Lots of shrimp and seafood. I was amazed my kid ate 90% of her adult portioned pasta after stuffing herself with all the olives she could put her hands on! For 'secondi' we had the fritto misto - octopus, shrimp, tuna and squid. The house white wine was fantastic! All together came down to $60 euro. Service is a bit slow but it's the Italian way. Oh, and since they only had room outside (we didn't have a reservation) they brought us blankets because it was a bit chilly. Win-win!

I went here because I have heard terrible things about the Grotta Palazzese food and price. This…read moreplace is toward the east of there and is quite understated from the front. I had a seat upstairs where there was plenty of seating area, plus 2 other floors below. There were fantastic views from the upstairs balcony, but a little windy. Unfortunately the food isn't as good as the views. While not bad, I would rate the food as about average. Service was below average. I was eating my appetizer and had to remind him that I ordered wine. Very unlike an Italian restaurant not to serve you the wine first! I think he was upset that I didn't order water. The only size they had was .75L and it was in a glass bottle, meaning I couldn't take it with me if I didn't finish it. No thank you. Anyway, the calamita was ok and the rest of the experience was about average.

This was a lovely find when looking for a place with a view not far from the masseria we stayed at…read morein Monopoli. It seems nondescript and in an average neighborhood - i.e. not a tourist in site- except for the fact that you have a front row seat on the balcony to the Adriatic. Very low key, all locals, perfect. Great seafood, loved the orecchiette in squid ink with mussels, clams, and squid, and the zucchini flan appetizer was so good we had it twice. Serene evening on the water, great to also watch the sunset in the summer.

I visited this restaurant for dinner on a Saturday night around 22:00, as it was recommended by a…read morelocal person to try some nice octopus pasta. The place was fully packed, but luckily I had to wait for a free table only for 5 minutes. The restaurant is definitely outdated and generally felt "not fresh." Its design is very simple, including very basic tables and uncomfortable chairs. Even the dishware they use to serve food is just basic-looking and boring. So aesthetically, this place did not catch my sympathy, except for a giant octopus figure hanging in the middle of the restaurant. Also, because the restaurant is small, it was very noisy inside. My waiter was fast and brought me a menu right away; luckily, there is a menu in English available. Unfortunately, the waiter spoke very poor English, so it was hard to communicate with him. Plus, I have to be honest, I did not like his attitude - he was not very friendly and seemed like he really hated doing his job. At the end, it was very hard to catch his attention and ask him to bring the bill; he literally passed by many times and never even looked at me or checked on me once. I spent almost 10 minutes just trying to catch his attention and ask for the bill. The restaurant's menu is big enough and has a good selection of classic Italian dishes - most of them are seafood. As I mentioned earlier, I was recommended to order octopus pasta, and Spaghetti all'assassina di polpo (Spaghetti all'Assassina with octopus) seemed like a perfect choice for me. Plus, for an extra €2 it was possible to add stracciatella cheese, which of course I did. For a drink, I ordered my favorite Italian iced tea brand - Estathé. Also, right away the waiter brought me a basket of bread (included as coperto - table service), and this bread tasted fresh and nice. I got my spaghetti within 15 minutes. Besides the unattractive white plate the food was served on, the dish itself looked quite messy. The cook definitely did not take care of its presentation. But the smell from the dish was very nice, which convinced me to try it immediately. Luckily, I was not disappointed in the flavors, but I also did not love them. Spaghetti all'Assassina (spicy, partly dry and partly soft, slightly charred Bari-style pasta) was cooked very well; I maybe wish it were a little less spicy and less charred, because I could taste some burnt flavor. The octopus seemed slightly overcooked too - some of its parts were burned and very dark. This burnt taste definitely lowered my overall impression of the dish, but I still liked it and moderately enjoyed eating it. By the way, stracciatella cheese on this dish is definitely a plus - it brings a nice fresh flavor, so I recommend adding this cheese to Spaghetti all'Assassina, as suggested on the menu. The size of the portion was big and filling, and I appreciated that they were not cheap with the amount of octopus. Price-wise, this restaurant seemed somewhat reasonable - half of the appetizers, for example, were around €20, which is quite a high price for an appetizer; and many main dishes started from €20 and higher. My Spaghetti all'Assassina with stracciatella cheese was €20, €3 for the iced tea, and €2.50 for table service (bread). In total, I ended up paying €25.50, and I find it slightly overpriced for my overall just satisfactory experience at this place. The business accepts all major credit cards and Apple Pay, by the way. Can I recommend this restaurant? Honestly, I do not. Nothing about this place left a great or exciting impression on me. But the Spaghetti all'Assassina with octopus is still worth trying at least once, so if you specifically want to try this dish, you can give the restaurant a try. Maybe you will have better luck with the food quality and taste than I did.

Fresh tasty seafood. Good size portions. There is a minimum number of dishes they expect customers…read moreto order, but nothing crazy if you have 3 people at your table. The place is not very big, coming when they just opened makes it easier to get a table without waiting.

This is my first time visiting Donna Gina. In all honesty we did not choose to go here, we had…read morereservations at their sister restaurant Grotta Palazzese (the cave restaurant) but there was an online error for a our reservation so we were bumped to Donna Gina... that said, the food was delicious and even tho the menu was "set" we could order whatever we wanted. My only concern was we had a fruit fly in one of our wines and the waiter didn't replace the wine... a little weird... hence my four stars and not five, on a whole excellent restaurant, beautiful location and attentive service.

Donna Gina's was terrible and ruined the last few days of our Italy trip. The three people who ate…read moreseafood got food poisoning and were violently ill with vomiting and the other stuff. When I told the restaurant their response was "you can't prove this was because of our food" - even after I explained that this is the only meal that the three of us ate the same food (it was a forced tasting menu and three of us got the seafood meal and three others got the vegetarian meal - these three didn't get sick) Even before we got sick, we were upset that the food was not good and service was even worse. Ironically, the manager came over to the table and said that the muscles give him gas after eating them after already ordering and having them presented at the table!!? Additionally, we informed the staff that we needed to leave at 11pm and we had not been given our main course or dessert after two hours of sitting at the table. The restaurant was not busy and half of our table sat without food for 45min., while the other half of the table was served multiple dishes. It was very strange. So basically we paid $900 euros for half of our meal. They even ordered us to wait at the front while they went back to our table to check if we signed the receipt, as if we were trying to avoid finalizing the bill. Save yourself from a terrible experience and never ever come to Donna Gina. They poison people and don't take responsibility

We spent an hour wandering the streets of the historic center when we stumbled upon this local gem…read more We have no idea how this compares to the other seafood restaurants in Taranto but we enjoyed ourselves and by the looks on the other faces in the crowded dining room it looked like were were not alone. During out entire 1-2 hours here we heard not a word of English. It looked like a local joint with families and singles on dates well represented in the crowd. We were greeted at the door like we were long lost relatives and hustled right away to a table. We were presented with menus but before we could open them we were beckoned into the next room where all manner of fresh caught seafood was lying on ice. I assume they were telling us to pick out what we wanted to eat (some of the choices were still moving around) but as they spoke no English and I even less Italian they could have been telling us anything and I would not have had a clue. We picked out swordfish, calamari, bream and something else that looked adventurous. At each selection the animal was ceremoniously plucked off the ice and placed on a large silver platter. Once we were done we were led back to our table which had been adorned with bread and cutlery in our absence. We still had not opened a menu. We looked around and noticed nobody had menus and they simply told the waiters what they wanted and a few minutes later it magically appeared from the next room on silver platters for the diners to inspect. Once approved the sea creatures were then off to the kitchen and their fate. Needless to say it was delicious and as fresh a fish as I have ever eaten. And I have lived on the beach where seafood was there for the taking. Not only did we have our fill but it was the perfect fuel for our mile walk through the February night back to the hotel. Our entire bill including wine was $46.00 We would definitely come back.