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The café is as much as part of Roman life as pasta and shopping in the streets around the Spanish Steps. But being a large, bustling city, full of loony drivers and fast-talking locals, it can be an overwhelming place for first-time visitors, and even for experienced travellers! Fortunately, Joe Wolff and Roger Paperno’s visually delightful book, Café Life Rome, will guide you through the cafes and bars of the Eternal City, one of the world’s most popular destinations…
OFTEN YOU WILL SEE MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT EATING GELATO AND FINDING COMPROMISE WHERE THERE MIGHT OTHERWISE BE NONE. FUNNY HOW DISAGREEMENTS SEEM TO MELT AWAY OVER A LARGE CUP OF CIOCCOLATO AND NOCCIOLA…
In an unfamiliar city, it’s always nice to know where you can get something special at a reasonable price, without bumbling around for hours. So, go ahead, rub elbows with the Romani as they chug an ounce of espresso in a tiny cup on the way to work, or linger all afternoon over a cappuccino and gelato and soak up the local colour.
Rome is a city full of cafés or bars (the terms are interchangeable) – about 8,000 in total. Most are family-run, passed down from one generation to the next; some are 100-years-old in buildings that are themselves hundreds of years old. Each has a story to tell, a family history told straight from the horse’s mouth.
Physically, little has changed in Trastevere (an area of the city) in the last 500 to 1,000 years – you could be walking around a small medieval city. Originally inhabited by foreigners, Jews and “marginal” types of the day, like thieves and prostitutes, today it is a popular place to live with expats and artists. You’ll find lots of nightlife in pubs, restaurants, and pizzerias on the weekends.
Imagine Danny DeVito with a moustache, speaking Italian – that’s Mario Bianchi, owner of Bar Trilussa (Viale Trastevere, 76), which is a stand-up-and-drink-your-coffee-at-the-bar type of place on the way to Porta Portese, the huge Roman flea market, and a good stopping-off point while exploring Trastevere. Bianchi enjoys rubbing shoulders with the common man. “I love my work because it forces me to communicate with people… I’m a great talker…a real chatter box.” Over the years, he’s chatted with the likes of Marcello Mastroianni and Domenico Modugno, the Italian singer of 'Volare’ fame, who often dropped in to buy a bottle of sambuca – both have been regulars at Bar Trilussa.
All roads lead to the Pantheon. This area around Piazza della Rotonda is strategically located in the heart of the centro storico, or downtown, area of Rome. It’s firmly believed that the government in Italy is all the better for gelato – especially the kind found in Gelateria Giolliti (Via Ufficio del Vicario, 40), just off Piazza di Montecitorio, which houses the Italian House of Representatives. Often you will see members eating its exquisite gelato and finding compromise where there might otherwise be none. Funny how disagreements seem to melt away over a large cup of cioccolato and nocciola… The Giolliti family is fanatical about the quality of its gelato; this means fresh eggs from Rome, fresh milk from the Central Dairy in Milan, and, of course, seasonal fruit. This explains why Sharon Stone has paid a visit and why the Pope regularly orders gelatos from here for his summer residence.
Also by the Pantheon, Caffé Sant’Eustachio (Piazza Sant’Eustachio,
82) is one of the most famous coffee bars in Rome. Some even say it has the best coffee in the Eternal City. Certainly the Ricci brothers, Raimondo and Roberto, would agree. They are the owners and their speciality of the house, gran caffé, a creamy, frothed-up double espresso, already sweetened, is to die for. Signor Ricci is serious about secrecy: He has a shield around his roasting machines so you can’t see the exact mixture of beans. The Sant’Eustachio clientele includes a variety of people. Once Catherine Deneuve came in and, for no apparent reason, left a rose on the counter for the barista.
A little bit of Naples in Rome, and probably the best pastry you’ll ever eat – that’s what you’ll find at Pasticceria Bella Napoli (Corso Vittorio Emanuele, 246), near the famous Piazza Navona. The speciality of the house is the sfogliatella. It is fan or shell-shaped, with semolina, ricotta, orange essence, candied fruit, and nuts encased in thin layers of flaky dough, and has an incredibly light, delicate flavour.
If you’ve never tried one, go directly to Bella Napoli for your first breakfast in Rome. Two sfogliatella for breakfast could hold you through lunch. The famed film director Frederico Fellini used to drop in from time to time. Once, he even complimented Signora Barbaro, the owner, on her eyes.
Gelateria Pellachia (Via Cola di Rienzo, 105), near the Vatican, was set up in 1890 as a latteria, or small dairy, by Giovanni Pellachia, who, like most latteria owners, got the milk from his own cows. Today, his grandson, Gianni, is still running the family business, which has evolved while resisting the urge towards total modernisation. “Today you see so many trendy flavours of ice cream… soy, celery, parsley, tomato. Here, we make only classic flavours, with fruit that’s in season,” says Gianni. The gelateria is also known for its rich hot chocolate and has won an award for it from Cioccolata & C., an Italian monthly culinary publication. Again, Pellachia’s classic approach – heating the chocolate very slowly in an old cioccolatiera – helped win the award.
Gelateria Pellachia has had all kinds of fans, though some of them were certainly not the kind of clientele you’d want to cultivate. During World War II, the German SS headquarters for Rome stood on Via Boncompagni, and the officers and enlisted men soon discovered the gelateria. As a result, in spite of strict rationing, Pellachia always got the materials it needed to produce its marvellous gelato. Gianni tells the story of the last Germans leaving Rome as the Americans came in – they came in armed and presented Gianni’s father with a box of hazelnuts for his gelato and a tin of lard, which was hard to get during the war. “Then they left in a hurry.”
Antico Caffé del Teatro Marcello (Via del Teatro Marcello , 42) sits on a street that didn’t exist until the 1930s, when Benito Mussolini, in his infinite wisdom, decided that the centre of Rome needed a number of wide roads. When the Fascists rebuilt the
Teatro Marcello area, many homes were torn down, but the café managed to survive more or less where it was. In the old days, all of the café’s clients were Romans. Today, a variety of Italians and tourists come here, including well-known politicians and writers.
Nearby, Alberto Pica, owner of Bar/Gelateria Alberto Pica (Via della Seggiola, 12), is a man on a mission – to promote fresh, high-quality gelato. Signor Pica is a fanatic about Italian gelato, which is undoubtedly the best ice cream in the world. According to one school of gelato folklore, it all began with the famed Italian gelato makers of the Renaissance, and the story of Signor Buontalenti, cook and pastry maker for Cosimo I of the powerful Medici family, who got the idea to flavour cream with citrus fruit and then refrigerate it. Signor Pica is part of this gelato tradition. “There has always been a bar or café or gelateria in the family, and from the time I was a boy, we were always making gelato,” he says. Nowadays Romans come from all over the centro storico to Gelateria Alberto Pica. It’s especially busy during summer evenings, when it seems that almost every ambulatory Roman is on the street eating gelato and enjoying life.
After all, the modern Romans are well known for this attribute of enjoying life. There is a saying, in dialect, that best describes the Roman character, 'Ce piace mangia beve…ce piace poco lavora,’ which means, 'We like to eat and drink... we don’t like to work,’ and understandably so.
Café Life Rome, written by Joe Wolff with photography by Roger Paperno, is published by Arris Publishing Ltd at £12.99.
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