Izumi Ristorante: We needed more pasta like we needed a hole in the head, so we headed to sushi. Like other European sushi places, it also served ‘Chinese food’ (read: noodles intended to resemble lo mein) and local food (read: risotto and spaghetti). We ordered a sushi sampler and one roll each, and the fish was fresh enough. The sauce on the spicy salmon roll was mayo-based like in the US, but about as spicy as apple juice. The default eating utensils were forks, and the server seemed surprised when we accepted her offer of chopsticks. Overall, just what we needed – and I even learned the Italian word for (imitation) crab.
Piedigrotta: B chose this place because it featured the Genovese specialty: pesto. He ordered the pesto-covered troffi, a pasta resembling a tightly woven, skinny rotini. I ordered the fish of the day, which was a white fish, lightly breaded and cooked in tomatoes and olives. Overall, a decent meal, though I did get bitten by more mosquitos, of course.
Gelateria Russo: I had to try their gelato because they had a flavor called Violet; presumably the flower, not the color, though food coloring was visible in full force. Because a small gelato comes with two flavors, I quickly spotted a second one to try: rose. They both tasted a bit artificial, though this was not in the least surprising. That said, the flavors came through, as did my brain freeze. B had reheated pizza, because it was 4:30 pm, and we hadn’t eaten more than a few cookies all day.
La Cremeria delle Erbe: When we got to the center, it was still too early for any restaurants to be open, so I was ridiculous enough to have gelato again. (Did I mention that a few cookies and a small gelato were all I had eaten, and it was 6 pm?) This time, I got almond and yogurt, and B had chocolate/hazelnut, vanilla/hazelnut, and a third flavor that neither of us can remember.
Osteria il Cadraio: This was the dinner we finally wandered our way to. It was a cute restaurant, filled with mostly French people. B ordered the minestrone, which surprisingly featured pesto. I again ordered the fish of the day, which was apparently the fish of the week – since it was exactly like the other one. Except these tomatoes were fire-roasted, which left a somewhat bitter taste on my tongue – and the fish quality was not as good. But the service was good, and they only looked a bit traumatized that we didn’t order any wine.
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