Exactly 1782 years and 2 days after Rome’s defeat by Hannibal’s armies, Sasha and I, along with our dear friends Cosimo, Christine, Domenico and Angelina, arrived in Cortona.

Of all the Etruscan gateways to Cortona, there is only one that remains intact, the Porta Bifora, called “La Bucaccia” or “evil hole”. La Bucaccia owes its fame (and its name and closure until 1996) to 1258, when the citizens of Arezzo and the exiled Cortonese Guelphs entered Cortona through this gateway and sacked the town.

Just up Via Ghibellina from the Porta Bifora sits a stunning example of Tuscan cuisine at its finest, Hostaria La Bucaccia. This restaurant, heretofore overlooked by Micheline, is sure to one day receive the star it well deserves. Run by Romano Magi and his exceptional, master chef of a wife Agostina, with ample help from their adorable daughter Francesca, La Bucaccia is not only the best restaurant in Cortona, but of all the places we ate on our Italian tour, it was my favorite.

Romano and Agostina Magi and Chad

Entrance to Hostaria La Bucaccia

The interior of La Bucaccia is the former cellars of the 13th century Palazzo Cattani

Cinghiale Paradise - wild boar sausage, prosciutto con melone, salame, finocciono with apricot, and bressola with apples. You sure can't get this in the US.

Carpaccio of black pork with fresh greens and balsamic

Tagliatelle with fresh black truffle, fresh ingredients perfectly cooked with that wonderful truffle flavor

Sant’Egidio style chestnut Ravioli filled with ricotta and sprinkled with mint flavored porcini mushroom sauce

Pappardelle with wild boar ragu; savory and sweet, rich and delicious, this is a classic cortonese/tuscan dish that perfectly captures place and transcends time

An up close look at one of my favorite pasta dishes ever: pappardelle al cinghiale ragu (wild boar)

Sliced steak of black pork in a peppercorn sauce - an Agostina speciality

Grilled steak with lemon

Grilled steak topped with a smoky bacon flavored sauce

Grilled steak in a sweet red wine reduction sauce

Chocolate cake with cream and chocolate sauce

Tiramisu

Strawberry gelato

Biscotti perfectly compliment Vin Santo as a way to finish a great meal

Vin Santo 3 ways, all of them delicious

In this small but well equipped kitchen, Agostina makes magic happen

In Agostina's kitchen, with husband and partner Romano and sous chef

A few weeks before we left, I bumped into my friend David, a man known to enjoy a good meal or two in his time. “If you’re going to Florence, you have to go to Ringo’s,” he mandated. “It’s the best lunch in Florence.”

Outside tables at Ringo's

When you enter Ringo’s, located here, just steps from the Boboli Garden side of the Ponte Vechhio, you may ask yourself, “Am I in the right place? Can this tiny space dominated mostly by a kitchen and small bar by a temple of gastronomic pleasure?” Then, you are promptly (and politely) informed that this is a slow food establishment, and that if you are looking for a quick bite to eat, go eat elsewhere. And maybe the “Slow Food” sign helps too. This place means serious business.

Is this a gastronomic temple?

Ringo’s has been run my the same man, in the same way, for over 42 years. The maestro makes food one order at a time, using only fresh, local (he grows most of the veggies and herbs he uses) ingredients. He has been ably assisted for the past 20 years by his daughter, and with their back and forth banter in a typically expressive, Tuscan manner, gesticulating on each key word, forceful, passionate, respectful and loving all at once, you know that Ringo’s is more than a place to eat, it’s a family. Although it was empty when we entered at half past noon, we sat at the bar with the anticipation of a unique and extraordinary experience. And we were not disappointed.

Sasha and Il Maestro

Ringo’s is famous for his burgers; Roman-sized monsters of high-grade, fresh ground beef, simply grilled and topped with you choice of grilled onions and/or cheese. However, everything on the menu is extraordinary, including his daily pastas (only for 2), garden fresh salads, antipasta plates and desserts. Ringo is so protective of his food, he won’t let you over order. We had to come back twice (and very happily so) to try the breadth of his menu.

Botticelli's Primavera is a fitting image for Ringo's fresh focused cooking

Il Maestro at work

A simple amuse of grilled bread, fresh sliced heirloom tomato and a sharp, soft blue cheese

Garden fresh veggies ready for your plate

Veggie salad with cantalope, butter lettuce, arugula, heirloom tomatoes, red onion, basil, salt, pepper and Ringo's special mustard with extra virgin and aceto red wine vinegar served in a fish bowl

View from the top

A sandwich press, a stove top, and a grill; simple, well seasoned tools make simply delicious food

Ringo's pasta changes each day (or when he runs out of sauce)

Pasta is only served in portions for 2 people; On our vist the Daily Pasta was a tagliatelle in a cheesy sweet sausage ragu

Great hamburgers start with great meat, so fresh and flavorful Ringo doesn't even use salt

Every great hamburger joint needs special sauce...but Ringo's is the first mustard based special sauce I have ever had

Ringo hollow outs the bun top and fills it with ketchup; special mustard sauce goes on the bottom bun

Burgers on the grill...on the way to being eaten

And a radish on top makes it perfect...

A mild emmentaler completes the cheese version of Ringo's masterpiece

The best tiramisu I have ever eaten, bar NONE, comes served on the spoon

Ciao, Ringo; we can't wait to visit you again

La Giostra is run by members of the Hapsburg Lorena family. Italian princes from when Italy was under Hapsburg rule, the family home is at Barberino Val d’Elsa in Chianti where for many years, like others in the Chianti region, they had produced olive oil, wine and other culinary delights. The restaurant is run by the colorful and bracelet covered Dimitri, his brother Soldano and Anastasia.

The restaurant space (they have two dining rooms on the same street located here) dates from the sixteenth century when it was used as a storage area for the painted horses and other parts of the Salvemini square carousel. In fact, the restaurant takes its name, La Giostra, a word that used to mean ‘the joust’, from this very carousel.

Dining room and former carousel storage facility from the 16th Century

The food at La Giostra is traditional Tuscan; rich pastas, hearty meats and strong wines abound. I was seated for my first meal in Tuscany, surrounded by the cacophony of a full restaurant in an old, narrow, brick room, ordered a bottle of 2006 Canneto Vino Nobile di Montelpuciano Sangiovase and prepared myself for a feast.

Antipasta La Giostra: Bruschetta with pomodoro and chicken liver with rabbit, tomato, mozzarella and mortadella, roasted peppers, potato salad and two mini quiches

Tagliatelle con Porcini and Nipitella alla Toscana, a mix of traditional Tuscan spices

Osso Bucco La Giostra; Amazingly sweet and soft (almost candied) carrots make this dish shine

For those interested in this very fine restaurant’s menu…here’s some it is.

Chad & Sasha with Massimiliano and Raffaele Alajmo

Lunch began with a collection of amuses. The first was three tastes: a mini pizza margherita, cod fish salad encased in fried polenta and sprinkled with curry power, and an amazing little ball of Fassone beef carpaccio on a stick topped with shrimp crudo, chive and pink Peruvian pepper. There was something inside the Fassone ball that gave it a Rice Krispie-like crunch; I have no idea what it was but it was delicious.

Three Tastes...All Delicious

Along with the three tastes, we were served a mozzarella tagliolini atop a pomodoro and caper sauce. The skinned tomatoes were garden fresh, just bigger than cubed and perfectly complimented by the low salt, eel-like mozzarella tagliolini and the salty, big Italian capers. It was at this point that I ordered a glass of Flor di Uis 2006 Via di Romans.

At the same time, we were presented with the following bread basket.

Bread anyone?

For our first course, we split the Antipasto, which is a tomato garden on a plate. It consists of chopped, just picked fresh, red and green tomatoes fava beans, green beans, ricotta, basil, chili pepper and extra virgin olive oil.

A tomato garden on a plate

For our pasta course, I had maltagliati (a double wide noodle) with white asparagus, botarga, butter and parmesan. It was served in a huge stone bowl. Although everything about this dish suggested that it would be heavy, it was surprisingly light, hearty, creamy, salty and delicious.

Maltagliati and botarga anyone?

Sasha was treated to Lasagnetta with a lamb ragu. This dish is one of the finest lasagna’s you will every eat. The round noodles were perfectly cooked and had a light texture to them. The lamb ragu, sweet and savory, was topped with creamy bechamel and complimented by subtle ricotta. We were again amazed by the lightness of the cooking for what is traditionally a heavy dish.

Little lasagna, BIG taste

My meat course was a real treat; roast suckling pig with cream of potatoes, and amatriciana sauce. The pork was tender with a crunchy top, sweet and flavorful. The amatriciana was the best I have ever had; rich tomato flavor with the savory taste of bacon and just the right amount of spice. A forkful of the pork all’amatriciana combined with the creamiest, silkiest, smoothest potatoes I have ever eaten, brought my tastebuds to foodie heaven.

Sasha had a perfectly cooked and tender medallions of beef over broccoli with puff potato crisps, egg sauce and basilica peppers. The kick off of those peppers combined with the rich sauce really made this dish shine.

Although we passed on the cheese carts (yes, there are 2 of them!), but I thought I would capture it so I could share its treasures with you.

But we did finish the meal with some nice petite fours.

If you want to see more about the menu, you can download it here, but you’ll have to be able to read Italian. Also, Massimiliano has produced a beautiful and artful cookbook, titled “In.gredienti”, which was awarded the 2007 Gourmand World Cookbook Award for the best cookbook in the world. If you have $350 to spend on a cookbook that you probably can’t cook anything from, but want something that will look spectacular in your home, click here.

Chad and Sasha with master chef/owner Gianni Bonaccorsi

Il Ridotto is a little restaurant located on a precious square (more of a triangle) behind Piazza San Marco, located here. There are a few excellent enotecas nearby, including one catty corner to the restaurant also owned by Bonaccorsi called Aciugheta (it means “anchovies”). Sasha and I ordered the Chef’s testing menu (which had a wonderful description that I wish I had written down); at E50, it’s a feast and a bargain. The amuse bouche was potato wrapped roasted prawn on a bed of creamed potatoes, extra virgin and chive. The prawn was succulent and full of flavor and the crunch of the julienned potato wrapping combined with the cloud-like creamed potato was a winning combination.

Amuse Bouche @ Il Ridotto

Next up, I had a “fantasie di pesci” appetizer of warm and raw crudo. This included razorfish in a pepper salsa, cuttlefish with potatoes, mackerel with pickled beet, tuna, and one other fish that I can’t recall.

Crudo Delicioso

Sasha’s appetizer was a tower of beef tartar. The layers of tartar are presented on top of perfectly crisp and round toast and aretopped with a hard boiled quail’s egg. Accompanying this dish was a light salad of arugula with extra virgin and balsamic. The tartar was silky and flavorful.

For the pasta course, I was treated to a seafood risotto featuring branzino and octopus. The risotto was a perfect al dente and the flavor was rich and yet subtle. What really made this dish was the raspberry in the center. The berry was perfectly ripe and just a bit cooked so that when I touched it with my fork it easily came apart. The fruit cut each bite of risotto and added a wow factor without overpowering the delicate flavors of the pasta.

Raspberry Hurrah

Sasha was treated to a luxurious tagliolini with Piedmontese “Fassone” meat ragu. Fassone beef, rasied in Piedmonte, is renowned for its lean and delicious flavor. Again, the freshly made pasta was perfectly cooked and the ragu expertly seasoned. The Fassone was not only amazingly tender, but its delicate, sweet and savory flavor made this ragu very light.

Fassone - You Can't Touch This

We were so focused on enjoying our meal that we forgot to take pictures when the next course arrived and just started eating (which accounts for the state you see in the following photos). Up next for me was a breaded Dorade with asparagus puree and roasted carrot and zucchini. I was again amazed by the maestro’s ability to make what I expected to be a heavy dish taste so light. The puree was soft and sweet and perfectly complimented the fish. The breading did not taste fried, but almost as if the fish were born that way. The texture was as if the fish were steamed.

Sasha’s beef braised in red wine was served with creamed potatoes with extra virgin and chives. Another hearty dish prepared with a light touch. The beef bowed tenderly to the slightest touch of a fork and melted with each bite. Combined bites with the cloud-like potatoes produced a rich, sweet and savory experience.

Are you drooling yet?

We were already screaming for mercy, but Bonaccorsi would not stop. From Sicily came the Cassata Cheesecake with Cassata Gelato and a chocolate flan with vanilla gelato. I don’t think I have ever tasted anything like the Cassata Cheesecake with its tiramisu texture. Coffees were served along with four kinds of sugar.

Ever seen pink sugar?

Sasha outside the restaurant

The food was excellent and the service perfect. The waiter recommended a few reasonably priced white wines, and we chose a young (2008) pinot grigio that was perfect.

I ate a buccatini carbonara and then a cuttlefish stew with octopus and a sublime polenta (creamy and viscous, like grits or runy mashed potatoes, not rubbery and solid like in the states).

Sasha had a nice greek salad followed by a spinach tagliatelle with eggplant and shrimp. Her pasta was so delicate and smooth. It needed a bit of salt, but then came alive with a soft flavor of the shrimp that permeated the smooth texture of the paste. It was delicate and delicious.

Tagliolini with Shrimp & Eggplant

A Real Happy Meal