What can I say? This was my first time in Florence and a colleague of mine insisted on taking me out to try a classic Florentine steak (aka Bistecca alla Fiorentina). For those of you who don't know, that means a nice large ribeye, grilled rare to medium rare with nothing more than a little salt and pepper. In other words, heaven.
The first part of making a good steak dinner is selecting the right cut. The steak they chose for me was excellent, thick with plenty of marbling (aka flavor!), clearly their butcher knows what he's doing. The next part is cooking it right. Just enough seer on the outside, not overly cooked on the inside. Once again, perfection. The steak was one of the best I have had (outside of the ones I grill at home perhaps). I would not hesitate to go back.
Oh, I also had an appetizer. It was the daily ravioli special with sea bass and artichoke. Once again simple, yet prepared and served flawlessly. The waiter also selected a very nice Carmione from the Carmignano region in Italy that complemented the steak perfectly.
The one thing I didn't quite understand, and this is really not a reflection on the restaurant, but on me personally, was the bread. Apparently traditional Tuscan bread is prepared with no salt. I did a little reading to try to understand why this is and apparently no one really knows, but it's a tradition now and they're sticking to it. I will say that when it was brought out as fettunta (toasted bread with garlic and olive oil) it tasted great, but after that first piece of plain bread in the basket I didn't bother to reach for another. If that was the worst part of my meal, you know it had to be good! read more
