The Top 100 Places to Eat Near Essentia
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Rank 2. Casa Rusticale dei Cavalieri Templari
Emilian Italian
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Rank 3. Trattoria 'petito
Romagna Italian
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Rank 4. Benso
Contemporary Italian
A modern bistro tucked into a small garden in Forlì's historic centre, where the big windows and summer terrace do a lot of the heavy lifting. The kitchen runs contemporary Italian, with meat and fish dishes that lean personal rather than traditional. Lunch brings a lighter menu for anyone who has afternoon plans. Come evening, the cocktail list pulls real weight as an aperitif stop, and the digestif selection suggests nobody is in a hurry to leave.
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Rank 5. San Domenico
Classic Italian
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Rank 6. La Baita
Emilian Italian
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A glass-walled veranda dining room looks out over the Romagna hills toward San Marino, which is the kind of view that makes you feel the tasting menu is going better than it is. This is two-Michelin-starred fine dining, and chef Alberto Faccani builds menus that move between Emilian memory and quietly restless invention, with pairings that arrive somewhere you didn't expect but can't argue with. Service is gracious without being ceremonial, and the sommelier clearly means it.
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Rank 8. Da Gorini
Romagnolo Italian
A Michelin-starred restaurant in a small hill town in Romagna, where the kitchen leans hard on the grill: lamb, eel, and pigeon pick up smoke and char before anything fancier happens to them. The chef builds from local tradition, foraged mushrooms, game, and Mora Romagnolo suckling pig, then quietly pivots toward the unexpected. The kind of creative tasting-menu destination that gives you a reason to drive somewhere you'd otherwise only pass through.
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Rank 9. ‘O Fiore Mio
Wood-fired Pizza
A pizza shop set along Faenza's old city walls, with a following that stretches across Emilia Romagna and into Milan and Bologna. The doughs use organic Italian flours and long leavening, cooked in a wood-fired oven, and the menu walks you through a selection of extra virgin olive oils to pair with your slice. The room is informal and contemporary, the service moves, and the regulars already know exactly what they're ordering. Ranked 25th in Italy by 50 Top Pizza.
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Rank 10. Ristorante del Lago
Modern Italian
The drive up to Acquapartita, a mountain village at nearly 800 meters, is the first clue that this Michelin-starred restaurant takes commitment. The chef's cooking is rooted in Romagna's hills, mushrooms, trout, and game finding their way into modern plates with real conviction. The wine list runs to two volumes and nearly 1,600 labels, roughly 40 percent French, overseen with warmth by the chef's brother out front.
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Rank 11. La Campanara
Regional Italian
Outdoor tables beside a village church, trees overhead, hills in the distance: the setting alone makes a case for driving out to this trattoria in a hamlet outside Galeata. The kitchen leans on regional cooking where Romagna, Marche, and Tuscany quietly overlap, so the menu drifts between traditions in ways that feel earned rather than confused. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, with a small shop selling house-made provisions on the way out.
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Rank 12. La Buca
Seafood
The terrace sits right over the canal, close enough that you could theoretically dip a hand in, which is either charming or alarming depending on your relationship with water. This Michelin-starred seafood restaurant in Cesenatico focuses almost entirely on fish, from unfussy raw starters to more composed plates where pickled fruit and citrus show up alongside the catch. The wine list leans heavily into Champagne, which nobody seems to mind.
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Rank 13. La Cucoma
Seafood Italian
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Rank 14. Ancòra
Contemporary Italian
A Michelin-starred dining room inside a grand villa on the Adriatic coast, where the kitchen leans heavily on the catch and keeps the plates looking like someone put real thought into the geometry. The chef behind the stoves trained in serious kitchens, and the fish-forward contemporary menu shows it. Save room for the babà, a signature so light it barely seems to exist, which is the point.
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Rank 15. Dei Cantoni
Romagna Italian
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Rank 16. Civico 25
Pizza
A pizzeria in Emilia Romagna built around a social mission, where young people with disabilities and survivors of bullying make up the team, and where the pizza itself is the thing that keeps people coming back. The crust runs high and crisps nicely, and the panuozzo from Romagna and the pinsa round out a menu that takes the food as seriously as the cause. The staff greets you like they mean it.
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Rank 17. Osteria Bartolini
Seafood
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Rank 18. Casa Serafini
Contemporary Italian
Three tables face the kitchen directly, with a wood fire burning behind the pass, and those are the ones to ask for. This is a contemporary Italian restaurant in the Emilia-Romagna hills, run by a young chef who trained in starred kitchens before coming home to do things his own way. The menu comes in three versions, ranging from an open-handed tasting format to a vegetarian route, all built around a cooking style that shifts as he goes.
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The dough splits the difference between Neapolitan softness and Tuscan crispiness, which is either a compromise or a good idea depending on your loyalties. Gli Allocchi is a pizza spot in the hill town of Marradi, with a rustic room and a menu that leans into the surrounding countryside, including a pie built around Marrone del Mugello chestnuts when the season allows. The fried starters and desserts get equal attention from the kitchen.
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Rank 20. Osteria Bartolini
Seafood
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Rank 21. Terre Alte
Seafood
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Rank 22. L'Acciuga
Seafood Italian
Wooden panels and nautical fittings put you somewhere between a vintage fishing boat and a proper Italian seafood restaurant, which is exactly the spirit of L'Acciuga. The kitchen works from fresh catch and interprets it through a Romagnolo lens, with the anchovy spaghetti a good argument for staying put through dessert. The bar counter adds cocktails and kombucha to an otherwise serious wine list, because why not.
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Rank 23. Locanda dei Salinari
Romagna Italian
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Rank 24. Antica Trattoria al Gallo 1909
Regional Italian
The art nouveau interior puts "trattoria" in embarrassing air quotes the moment you walk in. This old-school Ravenna institution has been in the same family for what feels like forever, and the dining room runs accordingly: regional cooking built around truffles, local fish, and serious meats, while the owner works the floor with the easy warmth Romagna seems to produce in unlimited quantities. Book ahead; it fills up fast.
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Rank 25. Osteria del Tempo Perso
Contemporary Italian
Books and wine bottles share the walls with old photos at this intimate bistro tucked into a quiet corner of Ravenna's historic centre. Tables are small and close together, the lighting is low, and the whole thing has an almost Parisian feel that feels slightly unlikely this deep into Emilia-Romagna. The menu runs contemporary Italian, the wine list strays into the rest of Europe, and you should book ahead, because the room fills fast.
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Rank 26. SaleGrosso
Mediterranean Seafood
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Rank 27. Terrazza Bartolini
Seafood
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Rank 28. Salsedine367
Contemporary Seafood
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Rank 29. Osteria Erbaluce
Grill Italian
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Rank 30. Osteria La Sangiovesa
Romagna Italian
The estate at Saiano raises the animals and works the land; what ends up on the table at this celebrated Romagna trattoria started there. The kitchen has been turning out green lasagna, piadina, and slow-braised country dishes for decades, with a chef who's become something of a local legend. The setting, inside a medieval village, leans theatrical in winter when the old theater rooms open up and the whole thing feels slightly unreal.
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Rank 31. Maré
Modern Seafood
A seafood restaurant tucked inside a private beach club on the Adriatic, where the dining room opens straight onto the sand and the umbrella rows stretch to the horizon. The cooking is careful and occasionally inventive, leaning into the catch with fresh egg pasta that mimics a risotto in the best way. The wine list leans heavily into Champagne, which, given the setting, feels like exactly the right call.
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Rank 32. Veranda
Seafood
A glass-enclosed veranda on Cesenatico's main avenue, busy with summer promenaders just outside the windows, while inside the focus stays firmly on the Adriatic. This is a seafood restaurant in the straightforward sense: raw catches, gratins, pasta, risotto, grilled and baked fish, the daily specials announced aloud at the table. Alberto Faccani, the name behind Magnolia, oversees the kitchen, keeping things rooted in local maritime tradition rather than reaching for the clever.
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Rank 33. Da Marchesi
Regional Italian
A roadside trattoria in the hills above Novafeltria, where the Apennines split Romagna from the Marche and the pasta is rolled by hand every morning. The kitchen follows the seasons and leans hard on local meat and whatever porcini the hills have given up lately. The Michelin Guide awards it a Bib Gourmand, which is their way of saying the food punches well above its price. Bring an appetite and no particular hurry.
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Rank 34. Margherì
Neapolitan Pizza
A Neapolitan pizza spot in Cesenatico, steps from the old canal port, where the dough gets a proper rise and the tomato sauce is sweet enough to notice. The team runs a warm room, with the front-of-house steering first-timers through the menu and the pizza maker keeping things lively from the oven. Exactly the kind of neighborhood pizzeria that doesn't need to announce itself.
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Rank 36. Onda Blu
Adriatic Seafood
The dining room seems to grow straight out of the beach, with big windows framing the Adriatic and a room that's noticeably more polished than the setting suggests. This is a proper seafood restaurant built around the day's catch, with classic dishes from the Adriatic coast and daily specials that follow the market wherever it goes. The wine list reaches well into France, which is a quiet flex for a place this close to the sand.
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Rank 37. Casa Gasperoni
Romagna Italian
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Rank 38. Lazaroun
Romagna Italian
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Rank 39. Il Chiosco di Bacco
Italian
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Rank 40. Il Piastrino
Italian
Trout and eel instead of sea fish, aromatic herbs, and mushrooms pulled from the hills between Montefeltro and Tuscany: the kitchen here is deeply, specifically local. Il Piastrino is a Michelin-starred country restaurant in the small hill town of Pennabilli, where the cooking is creative but never restless, and the room has the kind of warmth that suggests the owners genuinely wanted to be here.
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Rank 41. Il Grifone
Contemporary Mediterranean
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Rank 42. Il Cedro
Tuscan
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Tucked into the forests of Casentino, this contemporary dining room opens onto the trees through floor-to-ceiling French doors, so lunch arrives with a side of absolute silence. The kitchen leans into its surroundings, building tasting menus from the kind of ingredients a city restaurant would call a sourcing story and a local one just calls Tuesday. The crowd runs to couples who drove a while to get here and don't mind at all.
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Rank 44. Da Lucio
Seafood
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A Michelin-starred creative restaurant in Rimini's city centre where Argentine roots and a globe-trotting sensibility meet Italian tradition. The chef and his partner run a quietly personal room that feels more like a well-appointed private home than a destination dining spot. Tasting menus lean toward fish or meat, but guests can build their own path through any dish on offer. Book the terrace early if summer is your plan.
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Rank 46. Locanda Pincelli
Creative Italian
Named for the village's former postman, this relaxed trattoria in a converted workers' club has a shaded porch for summer meals and a menu that drifts pleasantly away from straight Emilian tradition into something more inventive. The kitchen is generous with portions and precise about presentation, and the wine list is short enough that asking the owner for a steer is genuinely half the fun. A Michelin Bib Gourmand.
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Rank 47. Osteria de Börg
Romagna Italian
Checked cotton tablecloths and bottles lined up on the shelves set the tone at this old-school osteria in Borgo San Giuliano, the painted fishermen's quarter that Fellini grew up loving. The kitchen stays deep in Romagna tradition: house-cured meats, fresh pasta, and Mora Romagnola pork cooked several ways. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand, which tracks with the crowd of locals who seem entirely unsurprised to be eating this well.
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Rank 48. La Marianna
Seafood
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Rank 49. Dallo Zio
Seafood
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A courtyard garden tucked into the old center of Rimini gives this pizzeria its name and its best table. The menu leans hard into dough variety, with six different versions to choose from and a range that runs from 1980s-style flat pizzas to gourmet toppings, all landing on the affordable side. Regulars come back for the seasonal creations, which the team names after butterflies. A 50 Top Pizza Italy listing for the Excellent Pizzerias category.
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Rank 51. Vite
Modern Mediterranean
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The name comes from the fifteen curves of the Mugello Circuit just up the road, and the menu follows the theme with more charm than gimmick. This pizzeria serves contemporary Neapolitan pies at dinner, with ingredients sourced from small Italian producers and pairings that treat the pizza as a full dish rather than a vehicle for toppings. Lunchtimes bring Roman-style pizza al taglio. The room runs fast and friendly, the way a place near a racetrack probably should.
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Rank 53. Guido
Seafood
From the outside it reads as a chic beach club gazing out at the Adriatic; step inside and the elegance turns hushed and a little unexpected. Guido is a Michelin-starred seafood restaurant, now in its third generation, built around the flavors of the upper Adriatic coast. The cooking looks simple at first, then quietly reveals the kind of technique that doesn't announce itself. An old-school institution with nothing to prove and nowhere to rush.
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Rank 54. i-Fame
Modern Italian
A dessert called i-CLOUD, a soft yogurt foam over vanilla panna cotta with sorbets, tells you something about the ambitions here. This is a contemporary Italian restaurant in Rimini where the menu leans hard into Adriatic fish, treated with modern technique but enough substance that you leave full. The room is all white walls, mirrors, and glass, with a garden terrace that earns its keep in warmer months.
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Rank 56. Corbezzoli
Contemporary Italian
A garden frames the dining room through wide picture windows at this creative Italian restaurant tucked inside a hotel on Bologna's quieter side. The kitchen moves across vegetarian, meat, and fish dishes without committing to any single lane, and tasting menus sit alongside à la carte for those who prefer to graze rather than surrender the wheel. The baba with pastry cream and sour cherries has a reputation that precedes it.
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Rank 57. Storie Dipinte
Pizza
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Terracotta floors, exposed brick, and shelves of bottles stacked floor to ceiling set the scene at this farmhouse restaurant outside Pontassieve. The menu moves between charcuterie, classic Tuscan meat dishes, and a few seafood options that keep things from feeling predictable. The wine list leans toward bottles that are considered rather than expensive, which is its own kind of statement in a region where the opposite is easy.
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Rank 59. Seta Sushi Restaurant
Japanese
A medieval courtyard in central Bologna is a genuinely odd setting for a sushi restaurant, but the contrast works. The dining room runs modern bistro, and in summer the courtyard fills up nicely. The menu stays close to Japanese tradition with a few personal riffs, and the front-of-house team is unusually good at walking newcomers through both the food and the sake list without making anyone feel remedial.
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Rank 60. Osteria Numero Sette
Emilian Italian
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Rank 61. I Portici
Mediterranean
A Liberty-style frescoed ceiling inside a converted 19th-century musical café sets the scene for this Michelin-starred fine dining restaurant on Bologna's grandest boulevard. The kitchen runs Mediterranean-leaning tasting menus in three lengths, and if the main room feels too grand, the 14th-century icehouse downstairs has a glass floor looking straight into the wine cellar, which is exactly as theatrical as it sounds.
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Rank 62. Al Cambio
Emilian Italian
Parmigiano and mortadella turn up in nearly every corner of the menu here, which tells you everything about where this modern trattoria stands. The team calls their pastas "soups," a nod to old Emilian convention, and the desserts follow the same unambiguous logic. The wine list leans hard into Emilia-Romagna but keeps a surprisingly serious champagne section for when the mood shifts. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, and the bill makes that feel reasonable.
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Rank 64. All'Osteria Bottega
Emilian Italian
Tucked down a side street under Bologna's porticoes, this trattoria treats Emilian cooking as a thing that doesn't need improving. Fresh pasta, cured meats, local wines, and a zuppa inglese with alchermes cake that closes the meal in the most unapologetic way. The room is small and warm, and it books out every day, so reserve before you assume good fortune is on your side.
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Rank 65. Acqua Pazza
Mediterranean Seafood
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A tiny ravioli shop in a quiet residential corner of Bologna, where a Franco-Italian-Chinese couple cook what they call "migrant" food: Chinese dumplings alongside dishes that wander from Emilia-Romagna through the Mediterranean and into Asia. The menu changes daily with the market, seating runs to about twenty inside, and a few tables appear outside in summer. Book ahead, because this is exactly the kind of neighbourhood spot that fills up fast.
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Rank 67. Iacobucci
Contemporary Italian
A Michelin-starred restaurant set inside a historic villa outside Bologna, where the chef builds a menu around the distance between Campania and Emilia-Romagna, two regions that don't naturally talk to each other but have plenty to say. The wine list runs deep, with multiple vintages of Sassicaia and Tignanello for anyone who wants a reason to linger. The garden is there if you need somewhere to quietly reconsider your life choices after the rabbit stew.
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Rank 68. Enoteca Pinchiorri
Contemporary Italian
A seventeenth-century palazzo on Via Ghibellina, frescoes on the walls and fresh flowers everywhere you look. This is formal fine dining at its most Florentine, and it holds three Michelin stars. The cooking leans on luxury ingredients and deep Italian roots rather than trend-chasing, and the wine cellar has a near-mythological reputation among people who care about such things. The soufflé from the pastry kitchen is the thing everyone mentions.
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Rank 69. Osteria Bartolini
Mediterranean Seafood
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Rank 71. Trattoria di Via Serra
Emilian Italian
Bolognina sits just past the point where most tourists turn back, which suits this no-fuss trattoria in Bologna's old working-class quarter just fine. The kitchen runs on fresh pasta and regional recipes done without flourish, the tortellini in broth being the kind of thing you think about on the train home. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand. Book ahead, including at lunch, or you'll be thinking about it even longer.
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Rank 72. Serrae Villa Fiesole
Contemporary Italian
Floor-to-ceiling windows frame Florence spread across the valley below, which is a lot to compete with for a Michelin-starred restaurant inside a boutique villa hotel. The open kitchen keeps things honest, turning out creative Italian cooking with a Tuscan accent, meat and fish alongside a serious vegetarian menu. The summer terrace, predictably, is where everyone wants to be.
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Rank 73. Santa Elisabetta
Creative Mediterranean
The oldest tower in Florence, circular and Byzantine, holds just six tables on its first floor, lit by a Murano chandelier. That's the room, and it sets the tone for what comes next: a two-Michelin-star tasting experience built on Mediterranean cooking where the sea keeps surfacing in unexpected combinations. The chef's approach is deliberate and architectural, each course constructed rather than assembled. Book well ahead and dress accordingly.
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Rank 74. Il Palagio
Modern Italian
The dining room of the Four Seasons Florence, all frescoed ceilings and impeccable linens, holds a Michelin-starred kitchen that doesn't lean on the grandeur as an excuse to coast. The menu moves between land, sea, and vegetable without a fixed ideology, with tasting menus that split between the chef's own ideas and a Tuscan-rooted version. The service is expert without being starched, which, in a room this formal, takes some doing.
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Rank 75. Dalla Gioconda
Contemporary Italian
A short tunnel with porthole windows leads to a lift, which opens onto a glass-enclosed terrace at the very top of Gabicce Monte, with the Adriatic below and hills behind. This is a Michelin-starred fine dining restaurant where the chef pulls from local and broader Italian traditions and makes them feel personal. The wine list runs to French labels and pours generously by the glass. Come at sunset if you can manage it.
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Rank 76. Zivieri
Emilian Italian
The Zivieri family raises animals and grows produce in the Apennines, then drives it all down to Bologna and cooks it for you inside a medieval tower off Piazza della Mercanzia. It's a regional trattoria where the charcuterie and grilled meats are essentially the point, made from animals the same family farms. A butcher's counter next door sells the same stuff to take home, which feels either convenient or dangerous depending on your willpower.
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Rank 77. Atto di Vito Mollica
Contemporary Italian
A Michelin-starred fine dining room set inside a Renaissance palazzo a short walk from the Duomo, with sixteenth-century frescoes on the walls and a fountain you can actually hear. The kitchen leans into technique and balance over novelty, letting high-quality produce do the arguing. Service handles wine pairing and the closing coffee ritual with equal care. Dress accordingly.
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Rank 78. Sale Grosso
Mediterranean
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Rank 79. Trattoria Battibecco
Italian
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Rank 80. I Carracci
Contemporary Mediterranean
The seventeenth-century Carracci school ceiling sets the tone before you've ordered a thing: this is a fine dining room inside the Grand Hotel Majestic, dressed for occasions. The chef bridges Naples and Bologna with quiet confidence, a contemporary Mediterranean menu moving between sea and land. The sommelier is serious, but the cocktail pairings are the unexpected move worth noting.
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The building itself spans Via Stalingrado like a bridge, which sets the tone before you've ordered anything. By day it runs as a casual bistro with straightforward plates; by evening the room shifts into creative modern dining, all warm wood and a mostly female front-of-house team who seem to actually enjoy being there. The kitchen draws from Emilian tradition and then quietly departs from it, mixing regional references with a chef's own restless curiosity.
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Rank 82. Oltre.
Emilian Italian
The entrance, plastered floor to ceiling with stickers, looks more like a record shop than a restaurant, and the surfboard serving as a table near the door keeps that energy going. Inside, it's a casual contemporary spot in the Mercato delle Erbe, serving Emilian cooking that wanders confidently into other traditions, most famously a Bolognese ramen built around tagliolino in mushroom broth. Cocktails are available to open or close the meal. Book ahead.
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Rank 83. Trattoria da Me
Emilian Italian
The sfogline roll fresh pasta right in front of you, and the extra lengths go straight to the adjoining shop. This Bologna trattoria keeps one foot planted in the old school, with Sunday lasagne alla bolognese made the way your nonna's nonna would recognize, and one foot pointed forward in lighter, more contemporary preparations. A heated winter terrace means there's always an excuse to linger longer than planned.
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A Michelin-starred creative restaurant on the Arno where the chef splits his time between the open kitchen and the tables, wandering out to explain what he's just cooked and why it matters to him. Tasting menus or à la carte, your call. The wine list runs from solid contemporary labels to genuinely rare bottles from the '80s and '90s that serious drinkers will want to linger over.
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Rank 85. Gucci Osteria da Massimo Bottura
Contemporary Italian
A Michelin-starred restaurant inside the Gucci building on Piazza della Signoria, which is the kind of sentence you have to say twice. Massimo Bottura lends his name and his three-star sensibility to the project, while chef Takahiko Kondo runs the kitchen, threading Japanese instincts through an Italian frame. The tortellini in Parmesan cream is the dish regulars circle back to. Dress accordingly.
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A small L-shaped room tucked inside Hotel La Gemma, its walls done in an original green boiserie that somehow feels both old-Florence and quietly modern. This is a tasting menu restaurant, Michelin-starred, where the kitchen keeps each course to just a few elements and lets the precision do the talking. The cooking is creative without being showy, the kind of place where a goat's milk flan finished with aged balsamic vinegar makes complete, unhurried sense.
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Rank 87. Pizzeria Centrale
Neapolitan Pizza
A family-run pizzeria in a small Florentine town, now in its second generation, where the Neapolitan-style dough is kept lean on the crust for people who want crunch over chew. The menu is arranged in five sections, one of which leans on nostalgia, another on whatever the current chef felt like. Some of the mushrooms come from his own foraging trips, which is either charming or showing off, probably both.
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Two tables on a narrow balcony hang over the Arno just past the Ponte Vecchio, and the waiting list for those seats tells you everything. Inside the Hotel Lungarno, this Michelin-starred fine dining restaurant serves creative meat and fish dishes with a quiet Tuscan undertow, across tasting menus and à la carte. The chef keeps things refined without tipping into ceremony, which is harder than it sounds in a room this beautiful.
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Rank 89. Posta
Tuscan
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Rank 90. Span
Neapolitan Pizza
The menu announces that pizza has no owners, no masters, and belongs to the people, which sets the tone immediately. This is a Neapolitan pizza spot, one of three Bologna locations, with classic and creative pies, a short beer list, and traditional southern desserts. Reservations aren't taken, so a wait is part of the deal. There's a small terrace if the noise inside gets to you, and the bill won't get to you either.
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Rank 91. Trattoria da Amerigo
Emilian Italian
You enter through the shop, past shelves of wine and house-made sauces, before reaching the dining room of this old-school Emilian trattoria in the hills outside Bologna. The menu follows the seasons without making a fuss about it, built around lasagne with a tomato-free ragù, pumpkin-filled pasta, and tortellini in broth on the coldest days. Tigelle flatbread arrives alongside the ham. One Michelin star.
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Rank 92. Da Burde
Tuscan
Part deli, part trattoria, Da Burde sits just past the western edge of the city where the tourists thin out. The front counters piled with charcuterie and cheese aren't just decoration; they become the starters. From there it's braised meats, grilled meats, and the bistecca fiorentina as a matter of course. The wine list is broad and personally curated. Book ahead, because the regulars have no intention of giving up their tables. A Michelin Bib Gourmand.
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Rank 93. La Zanzara
Seafood
A Michelin-starred seafood restaurant on a tiny islet in the Po Delta, reached by a farmhouse that sits in near-total silence broken only by lagoon birds. The kitchen leans classic, which here means golden-fried seafood, steamed fish salad with house-made squid-ink mayonnaise, and eel cooked over embers the way it's been done in this corner of Emilia-Romagna forever. The caramelized beignets with mandarin sauce are a quiet nod to local pastry legend.
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Rank 94. La Chiocciola
Regional Italian
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Rank 95. Antica Trattoria la Grotta dal 1918
Emilian Italian
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Rank 96. Le Vele
Contemporary Seafood
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Rank 97. Osteria dell'Accademia
Regional Italian
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Rank 98. Trattoria Lanzagallo
Seafood
A seafood trattoria in the flatlands outside Ferrara that has been a local fixture long enough to count as furniture. The room has been freshened up without losing its unfussy bones, and the kitchen stays loyal to the classics, raw scampi lightly kissed with lemon zest, turbot under a potato crust. The Michelin Guide gives it a Bib Gourmand, which tracks: this is the kind of cooking where the fish does the talking.
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A bistro overlooking the Sant'Ambrogio market, which sets the tone for everything on the plate. The room is spare and the cooking matches it, straightforward Tuscan with flashes of imagination, the kind of place where squab turns up in agnolotti and feels like a completely natural idea. The wine list leans regional and runs across price points without making a fuss about it. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, and a small terrace for when Florence cooperates with the weather.
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The lampredotto on the menu tells you exactly where you are: a no-frills Florentine trattoria sitting next to its fancier sibling, Cibrèo, without any apparent envy. The kitchen sticks to old-school Tuscan staples, the room fills fast with people who know not to look at the prices twice, and the Michelin Bib Gourmand suggests the value is not accidental. Go for the stewed offal or the vegetable soup, and stay for the caramel panna cotta.