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    Terra Madre

    3.9 (56 reviews)
    ModerateItalian
    Open 12:30 pm - 9:30 PM

    Terra Madre Photos

    TERRA MADRE ATMOSPHERE

    What's the vibe?
    Moderate noise
    Casual

    Recommended Reviews - Terra Madre

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    My delightful cappuccino!
    Darragh B.

    I honestly can't tell you how many times I've walked past this place over the last few years, wondering "why the hell would anyone want to go down there?" as I glanced down the stairs looking at a table and 2 chairs beside a door, then walked off to go about my day. Today, me and the girlfriend walked down those stairs and couldn't be more pleased with our decision. Terra Madre is so small, I'd be surprised if you could fit 20 people, however has a nice homely aura about it. It knows what it is and it embraces it. The menu is small but varied and simple. For start I had the creamy buffalo mozzarella special that came with sardines, pumpkin, pesto and one other I can't remember. Herself got the bruschetta. Wonderful, no other way to describe it. Her bruschetta on the other hand came with 4 pieces, each with a different topping, including mozzarella, capers and ham. It was all divine! For main, we had the tomato tagliatelle pasta and the beef ravioli. The pasta tasted home made and was very well seasoned and the sauce was delicious. Needless to say, the plate was wiped clean with bread. My ravioli also didn't disappoint, great texture to the raviolis and the beef itself was also well seasoned. I did find it quite interesting as they were quite small raviolis, about the size of a €2 coin. However don't worry, there are plenty! Coupled this with 2 glasses of the house pinot grigio, I'm not usually a wind drinker but I thought it wasn't that bad actually! For desert I just had myself a cappuccino, this was prepared using freshly ground beans on their machine and arrived with a face in the crema which almost had a bigger smile than me. Service itself was fast paced, plates never lingered on our table for too long, despite the dining room being served by one very friendly gentleman. Most importantly, despite the fact that he was so quick to clear tables, with more and more people arriving, you never felt like you were unwanted or that they wished you would hurry up. I can't emphasise this enough, it's so easy to make a guest feel like they have overstayed their welcome and that they should leave, I don't think anybody felt this way tonight. Serious props have to be given. All and all, the bill came to €63. My coffee was on the house, however I don't want to assert this will be the case for everyone! If you're sticking to water, 2 starters and mains will cost you about €51. We gave a handsome tip too, all things considered, I feel that I'll be hard pressed to find another place to eat that offers so much for so little. I would go again next week, but I'm out of town. It's a shame, and slightly upsetting because I want to go again!

    Tomato pasta
    Ran P.

    Hard to find, but not hard to forget. Nice dark and intimate room and very friendly, italian staff. The menu is very limited, 3-4 mains and a couple of starters and thats it. I had a tomato linguini which was just ok. Most of us can make the same level at home. Dish size is very small, i had to eat all the side bread and still left a bit hungry. Drinks are only wine or water. Prices are normal, paid 12 e for my main. Would return only if looking for a quite fairly priced pasta. Nothing more than that

    Baccalá
    Catarina L.

    I tend to avoid Italian restaurants like the plague, because their food is often a poor caricature of a very interesting and complex collection of cuisine styles from the different italian regions. But after going by Terra Madre's stairs on Bachelor's Walk and looking at their menu I started getting more and more curious about this tiny place, neatly tucked away in a basement with a few tables and chairs outside. The restaurant only has about six tables, which wasn't a problem for us since we went there midweek, but I can imagine it's probably a good idea to book a table if you're planning on going there on a Friday or Saturday. Besides the tables there's a counter with a beautiful black Gaggia on top of it and a lot of wine bottles and a few flower jars spread around the place. Everything is of lilliputian scale and adorned with warm colors, flower prints or other painted details. Even the toilet paper and the handwash are cute! The menu features a selected few dishes to choose from, some bruschettas, pastas and a couple of traditional specialties - where you can find ingredients like trippa (tripe) and baccalá (salted and dried cod fish). The traditional dishes are definitely my favourite part of the carta, because they really are what I recognize as the more typical, almost homely food and tastes that I grew up with - a mediterranean heritage that we certainly share. But don't get me wrong, the rest of the food we had at Terra Madre was absolutely delicious. The first thing we were served was a simple small dish of toasted bread with herbs and olive oil - I immediately noticed how this olive oil was of very very good quality, and so this raised even more all my expectations for the rest of the meal. As a starter I tried a mouth watering carpaccio di porchetta that came served with some very good olives; I chose to have the baccalá in zimino dish and I also had a bite of the pasta my boyfriend ordered - which was perfectly cooked al dente. We tried two of the italian wines, a chianti for himself and a trebiano d'Abruzzo for me. Both were nice and fruity, though that style of red wine is really not our favourite. For dessert we shared a chocolate salami with blood orange, very simple but the quality of the ingredients made it work, the chocolate flavour was divine. I feel I need to talk about our waiter, he was so delicate and friendly the whole time. I loved the little details of the service, like filling our glasses with water very subtly every now and then and also the way he brought the food to the table and explained it. I also like the way he served the parmesan over the pasta: he brought a little plate with it and using a spoon sprinkled the cheese lightly over the pasta until we said it was alright. It's so rare to see such an effortless and attentive service. And we didn't have to pay for our two espressos, how cool is that? It was almost perfect, I just had two minor issues: the price of some of the dishes can be a bit too expensive and I wish the wine menu had a few more options, though I understand that it's probably just my problem because I'm not a big fan of most Italian wines. Again, these were really very minor things in the whole of the experience and I wouldn't think twice about going back to Terra Madre, for a cosy, nice and certainly appetizing dinner or lunch.

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    Terra Madre Reviews in Other Languages

    Review Highlights - Terra Madre

    sh). In the end, we chose to share a bruschetta, while I opted for a bowl of rabbit gnocchi for my m

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    San Lorenzo's - SAN LORENZO'S BRUNCH TACOS - Jerk chicken w/ avocado salsa, fried chorizo, red pepper mayo, iceberg lettuce, coriander, chili and lime

    San Lorenzo's

    (151 reviews)

    €€

    South Inner City

    This place shocked me!…read more I found San Lorenzo's via Yelp, so thank you Yelpers! It is one of the few places in Dublin that takes American Express cards. So you can leave home without it when you come here When we asked if they had a table they said only if you are up from the table in an hour. We were hungry so we agreed The environment is dark and tasteful and lively The wine list is not good, but the food and the staff make up for everything The avocado and caprese salad was awesome The shrimp in wine sauce was off the charts delicious The chicken breast wrapped in prosciutto was delicious and the polenta and creamed corn were spectacular The monk fish wrapped in crispy pancetta on a bed of pesto basil was amazing To top it off we had the Nutella cheesecake with Carmel sauce and gelato with biscotti crumbs on top- this was surreal!!! All this and we were done with all the food, a bottle of wine and cappuccinos in an hour and never felt rushed If you are in the mood for Italian food, come to San Lorenzo's

    The monthly special starter (Wild Mushroom Risotto) was amazing. Probably one of the best risottos…read moreI have ever had. We almost ordered another. After finishing the starter, it took a bit too long for the main dish to come out. Once it did come out, we were kind of full from the first dish. The wife for the Zucchini Primvera. The pasta seemed liked it could have been cooked a bit more. It probably needed another minute or so before it was Al Dente. Overall, the food was good and I would come back for sure.

    Sprezzatura

    Sprezzatura

    (14 reviews)

    Harcourt

    I'm so confused how this place has good reviews. Service was nonexistent. It was not busy. It…read moreseemed takeout was the busiest part of the restaurant. The pasta was cold and dried out. The only thing worth having was the sample platter of the arancini balls. Even those were hard to distinguish which ones were which. Definitely try a different restaurant if you're looking for Italian.

    Why I'll go back: wide variety of sauces lets you satisfy any craving…read moreYou HAVE to order: the arancini (how's that for a curveball) Tony's Tip: Given the generous portion size and wide variety of sauces, if you can do a group of 4-6 you'll be able to sample a lot more of the menu. Things I liked about Sprezzatura: - whatever you're in the mood for (marinara, carbonara, bolognese...), it's probably on the menu that night - the sauces are rich/heavy. I like, but maybe not everyone will. - generous portions - super friendly service Things I wasn't crazy about: - the finish on the table left a stickiness that was annoying as we sat through our meal - the kitchen door kept slamming shut (loudly) with every staff pass-through and needs some sort of better hinge or soft close mechanism - each pasta dish was a bit overrun with sauce. I might have soaked it up with some bread, but the amount was unnecessary for the pasta alone. We ordered three pastas dishes. I actually liked the one I didn't order the most - an amatriciana-like red sauce with a little spice. My wife enjoyed the Fettucini, Nduja and Mascarpone. The Mafaldine Cashel Blue (cheese) and Roasted Walnuts, which also had caramelized onions in it, was actually not as sweet as I expected (or wanted) it to be. What we did agree on, though, was how delicious the arancini was (we went with spicy sausage). I would lead with that...but don't get carried away. The wine choices were limited, but solid. And the price was very reasonable. I'd go back again (if I actually lived in Ireland!), mostly when I have a fix for a certain flavor. There was a lot of delivery business taking place during our visit. I suspect these sauces don't travel well (no firsthand experience with that), so dine in seems like the better call to me.

    Terra Madre - italian - Updated May 2026

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