How to eat in a restaurant in Italy

Arriving at the restaurant

Dinner reservations are the norm

Since so many restaurants in Italy are small, and because Italian diners tend to linger over their meal, only one or two covers per table are expected per evening. This makes the availability of tables at all but the most touristy of spots very restricted, and booking ahead almost mandatory.

At lunchtime you may have better luck, as many Italians prefer to have a lighter snack at a bar than a full meal. But if you want to eat at a specific restaurant on a specific evening, you should always reserve a table. You may have to book via telephone, and if the person on the other end doesn’t speak English you may have to ask for help, though some restaurants in Rome are on the Fork app, which allows booking without human contact.

Eating an early dinner is not a thing in Italy

Most restaurants are closed between lunch and dinner, and only reopen around 7.30 pm, or very rarely at 7 pm. Even if you make a reservation for this time, however, you may find that the kitchen is not at 100% availability until closer to 8.

Most Italians eat dinner between 8-8.30, but later dinners are also common, though not as excessively late as found in Spain.

If you find yourself starving for food between 2.30 and 7.30, you should go to a bar, which serves pre-cooked food and remains open during the afternoon.

Always wait to be seated

This is a universal courtesy in restaurants in Italy.

Because reservations are so common, you should never just waltz in and grab a table. This is considered very rude and may lead to you being asked to leave. Wait at the door or by the reception desk to be shown to a table.

If you haven’t reserved, this is the point at which you may find that there are no tables available. Even if all the tables in the place appear empty when you arrive, there is a strong likelihood that every single one is reserved for someone else. This misunderstanding can sometimes lead to confusion and even anger from visitors, who sometimes think they’re being turned away for prejudicial reasons.

Service

Service in Italian restaurants is usually on request, not spontaneous

With the exception of being given the menu, offering water, taking your order, and delivering your food, the waitstaff will likely leave you completely alone during your meal, even for delivering the check when you’re done. It may feel like rudeness to you, but it’s actually a courtesy: Italian diners don’t expect or want to be bothered by a stranger during what is usually a chance for pleasurable or intimate conversation. In fact even though we may be outraged at being largely ignored throughout the meal, it is interrupting diners unnecessarily that is seen as intrusive here. Service is also slow. You may wait 5-10 minutes after being seated before you get your menu. This is also normal and also a courtesy. So if you need something during your meal you will have to get someone’s attention. This is easier said than done! Alas some waitstaffs’ eyes seem to be allergic to anything other than their immediate task at hand. You may have to wave frantically or say “mi scusi” (though we hope it goes without saying that you should never ever click your fingers).

Ordering drinks

You will be offered water before you eat, but not alcohol or soda

The idea of welcoming booze while you decide on your order is anathema in Italy: Italians never drink alcoholic drinks without their food being in front of them.

Instead the waitstaff will give you a menu then casually ask “naturale o frizzante?” (flat or fizzy). They mean bottled mineral water, not tap water, and you’re expected to pay for it. Not a lot, just a few extra euro.

While you can ask for tap water (“acqua del rubinetto”), Italian diners almost never do this and asking for it can seem cheap. Restaurants operate on razor-thin profit margins, so we recommend you just accept the bottled water.

You will not get ice in your drinks

You are unlikely to be served any ice with your water, or indeed any other drink unless it’s a specific cocktail that calls for ice.

Even if you ask for ice you may get a quizzical look and just one or two cubes. We suggest getting used to this as most places are unlikely to have enough ice on the premises to satisfy an entire table of ice-lovers.

Your alcohol/soda order will be taken when you order food

Any drink that isn’t water is unlikely to be delivered until the food is ready: drinks are seen as complementary to your food, not to be enjoyed on their own. And certainly not if they contain alcohol: it’s a cultural rule that alcohol must always be drunk with food – hence the existence of the aperitivo tradition.

Except in the case of children, most Italians will either drink wine or water with food – rarely soda or beer, and never a cocktail or – god forbid – any kind of coffee. However beer is the norm with pizza.

Do not order coffee or tea to go with your food

Drinking coffee with food (unless it’s a piece of chocolate or a little cookie) is seen as revolting. The flavors are seen as far too strong and conflicting with the taste of the ingredients, which should be enjoyed in their most unadulterated form. We agree.

The distinctive and overwhelming taste of coffee is good to conclude a meal, and you will be asked for your coffee order after the final diner has finished their final bite.

Ordering food

Your food order will not be taken swiftly

After delivering your water and perhaps a basket of bread, the waitstaff may leave you with the menu for what may seem an indecent amount of time. This delay is deliberate: it’s for diners to consider the choices in detail, to chat, and to engage in long serious discussions about what wine to choose from what is usually an extremely extensive list.

Bread is usually served dry

You will likely be given a basket of bread while you’re deciding. While many Italian breads are amazing, this is unfortunately not universal, and you may find that basket of bread that’s dropped onto the table when your water is brought (for which you will likely to be charged a token couple of euro) full of bland, stale, dry fare. You may also find grissini (bread sticks) in packets, or fresh ones if you’re in a higher-end restaurant.

An exception to this is if you’re in a restaurant with a bread or pizza oven, in which you may be given freshly cut bread, and/or offered rosemary-scattered focaccia straight out of the oven – an opportunity not to be missed.

No dipping bread into oil or balsamic vinegar here – that’s a foreign invention – Italians just nibble it dry.

You don’t have to order from each course on the menu

The structure of a restaurant meal in Italy is usually in the following order, and the menu will reflect this:

Antipasti (appetizers)
Primi (starch dishes – generally pasta or risotto)
Secondi & contorni (protein dishes – meat/fish/cheese & sides)
Dolci (desserts)

As explained in our article about finding your way around an Italian menu, you don’t have to grab from each of the menu. Unless it’s a special occasion, most Italians will skip one or two courses, starting for example with a primo and going straight to a dolce, or going from antipasto to secondo and skipping dessert, etc. This is completely normal – and it’s also acceptable to order a vegetable contorno on its own.

Given the complexity of an order from several people who might jump around between courses, the server may ask if they should all the main-type courses be delivered to the table at the same time (“allo stesso tempo”) – i.e. all primi and secondi – or if someone’s ordered just an appetizer, if the appetizer should be served at the same time as everyone else’s main meal (“antipasto come primo”).

Italians rarely go off menu

In the English-speaking world we are very used to our every whim being taken care of, with extensive “hold the-“ and “can I substitute-“ or “sauce on the side” while ordering. While a small amount of substitution isn’t unheard-of (for example in the context of a fussy child), it’s absolutely not the norm here.

This is due to the fiercely traditional nature of inherited recipes: there is only one way to make carbonara, so asking to hold the guanciale, for example, renders that dish NOT carbonara.

Rather than trying to rewrite ancient recipes, Italians tend to look at the menu, decide if they want or can eat it (waitstaff are very attuned to enquiries about allergies, gluten, vegetarian dishes, etc – you can certainly ask about allergens and gluten, and indeed many menus will indicate them), then order it unchanged from how it’s been prepared by the chef hundreds of times before.

Don’t expect salt and pepper on the table

If you see this, you are either in a tourist trap or a very traditional trattoria that hasn’t changed since the 1970s. For many decades now it’s been considered that it’s the chef’s job to season the food, not the diner’s.

That said, if you do find yourself desperately craving salt (i.e. if the food is too sciapo), it isn’t considered terribly rude to ask for “un po’ di sale”, but don’t be surprised if you’re offered a salt catering pack from the kitchen rather than a dainty salt cellar, since so few Italians ask for it.

The exception is if the restaurant does salads, when you’re expected to dress it yourself and will likely be given a cruet set containing salt, vinegar, and oil. Italians will usually dress their salad by adding oil, tossing the salad, a touch of vinegar (if provided), tossing it again, then a shake of salt, followed by a final toss.

And while salt is a universal taste with its own receptors on the tongue, pepper is not: it’s an accident of history and its presence on tables all over the English-speaking world is essentially arbitrary. Thus while some Italian dishes contain pepper (famously in caccio e pepe) it isn’t the norm here.

A pizza is usually a substitute for primo and secondo

The exception to the above menu order is the pizza (in a restaurant as opposed to by the slice). If you order a pizza for one it’s usually so big that Italians will eschew both the pasta and protein courses.

Antipasto > Pizza > Dolce, even just a pizza.

And also as said, most pizzerie serve beer with their fare.

Pasta dishes are eaten on their own

This is the reason for writing this article, having recently dined with an American friend who scooped radicchio into her carbonara… As explained above, Italians are lovers of tradition, and nowhere is tradition more than when it comes to the important subject of food, and nowhere more fiercely guarded than the traditional pasta dishes.

Pasta dishes (primi) are always eaten on their own and never with a side. Ordering vegetables or meat to go with your pasta is seen as weird. Worse still, shoveling that side into the pasta dish is seen as completely gross and will likely lead to people coming out of the kitchen to watch in horror.

What you may do after you’ve finished the pasta dish is “fare una scarpetta” (“make a slipper”) – take a piece of bread and use it to clean the last of the pasta sauce from the plate. This can be seen as very complimentary, particularly if you’re eating at someone’s house.

You usually have to order sides to go with your protein course

Unless explicitly stated on the menu, protein courses (secondi) usually come with no accompanying vegetables (or just a small vegetable garnish). You are expected to order a side (contorno) to go with your secondo.

Salads are usually ordered on their own

An insalata is not usually treated as a side – salads are served with the secondo but usually eaten after the protein is finished.

You may also find a small salad as an antipasto, and in some restaurants you may find insalatoni on the menu. An insalatone is a big salad, that is usually seen as a complete substitute for a secondo.

Eating the meal

Italians don’t often ask for sauces

With the exception of pasta, most Italian dishes are sauce free – it’s expected that the ingredients sing for themselves without being drowned in strong flavors. Italians don’t put ketchup or mayo on anything other than fries or burgers, and A1 doesn’t exist in Italy.

Thus if you order a steak, for example, it will be seasoned perfectly and there will be (in the eyes of Italian diners and cooking staff) absolutely no reason to destroy the sensational taste of the meat by adding anything else.

If fries are on the menu then knock yourself out with ketchup or mayo, but more traditional places likely won’t even have these condiments in the back.

Main dishes tend to be eaten from their own plate

If you order a steak, for example, and some cicoria as a side, each will be served on its own plate. Italians tend to eat one thing at a time, so will likely not combine the plates. They may alternate between protein and vegetable, but the idea of loading a fork with more than one ingredient is seen as a little odd.

The exception to this is if people are sharing a contorno, when they will likely take a forkful or two of the side and put it on their secondo plate.

Sharing dishes is perfectly normal

If you want someone to taste your food, or you want to taste someone else’s, there is no taboo against taking someone’s fork and giving them a good helping to taste – even before you’ve tasted it yourself.

If you really want to share, you can ask for a piattino (side plate) to divide a dish up.

However we don’t recommend coming into a restaurant and just ordering a single course between two people as that can work out causing the restaurant to lose money, and may even be refused.

Try to keep your knife and fork between courses

Most mom-and-pop trattorie or osterie will expect you to hang on to your flatware – from antipasto right through to secondo. You should put them on the tablecloth as cleanly as possible, usually with the knife resting blade-down between the tines of the fork.

If you’re served meat, you will probably have your knife taken away and replaced with a sharp steak knife.

Note that this one is an indicator of the level of cuisine you are dining at: fancy ristoranti will indeed take your cutlery away between courses and replace them with new ones.

You need to cut your own pizza

Most restaurant pizzas (as opposed to pizza by the slice) are about 14″ round and

After your meal

The default coffee after a meal is an espresso

“Un caffè” will always be an espresso. Un caffe macchiato is espresso with a drop of milk. No other coffee will be offered after you eat.

You may be offered a complimentary amaro as a digestivo

You may be asked if you’d like a bitter drink such as a grappa, or a sweet liqueur like limoncello. If you show enthusiasm about the amari you may be offered a selection with a description of each one.

Usually this is a courtesy gift from the restaurant and you won’t be charged for it. Sadly it’s not offered, as I thought the first time it happened, because you are such a cool and appreciative diner.

Your bill may contain a few extra charges

On your bill you may see coperto or pane: cover charge or “bread” (a couple of euro per person). Italian diners very rarely dispute such charges.

There may also be servizio (service charge) based on a percentage of the bill but this is unusual and often indicative of a tourist trap.

You do not have to tip

Finally, this contentious subject.

Due to the excessive growth of the gratuity-based culture in the US, this is a contentious subject among visitors to Italy, and many transatlantic visitors find themselves feeling morally compromised by it.

But this article is about what Italians do in restaurants in Italy, namely if the service has been good or the servers seem like they deserve it for other reasons, Italian diners usually leave a few coins or a small bill or two on the table – but it’s completely understood if they just pay the bill and leave – and nobody will think badly of them.

A fixed percentage tip is not a thing, and hugely generous gestures – while obviously gratefully accepted – are at the same time seen as gauche and demeaning. You absolutely do not tip if a service charge is on the bill.

Tips, if left, still tend to be cash affairs: most people pay by card, and the card machines do not (yet) ask to add a gratuity on top.

If you are asked for a tip, you are in a tourist trap that has been corrupted by the presence of American tourists.

In conclusion…

Despite all the information above, always remember: you’re a visitor and you are not expected to conform to these unwritten rules. Unless you’ve lived here for years it would be impossible for you not to ‘break’ a few of them whatever you do.

That said, perhaps by understanding the mutual expectations of diners and waitstaff in restaurants in Italy, we hope that some of the more “inexplicable” things that people not from the country encounter may now be explained, and perhaps this article may prevent you from making some of the most grevious faux pas.

In the spirit of the food culture here, it’s best not to be too concerned. Italian restaurant tradition is as resilient as it is delightful. The most important thing about eating in restaurants in Italy is that you enjoy one of the things that makes Italy famous: a fierce tradition of exceptional food, based on fabulously high quality ingredients, and enjoyed in an atmosphere of warmth and appreciation for the dolce vita.