In all my travels, I noticed that it is commonplace for locals to recommend amazing authentic cuisine away from tourist areas. Nonetheless, I believe that Trattoria Osteria Dall’Oste disrupts that opinion. Though it’s located in front of the Santa Maria Novella train station in Florence, I would definitely say that this is a very full and busy restaurant filled with locals and tourists alike. When my husband and I arrived, there was even a line that went outside the door. Believe me when I say that after dining here, we certainly understood why it is so popular. Therefore, we are happy to share with you this culinary gem. Looking past the busy-ness of the restaurant, the interior decoration seems to be centered on red wine. Of course, it’s no surprise as it’s a steakhouse after all. Don’t let the hectic ambiance scare you off, the servers are quite adept in making sure all the customers are served in a quickly and timely manner. As Americans, we did not ever feel like the pace of our dinner was slow. Instead, it felt energetic, lively, and fun!
Nikola, the hospitable restaurant manager, explained that people come here primarily to enjoy their authentic Florentine steak from the Chianina cow breed and amazing local Tuscan wine. They have four different kinds of steak but the most delicious and special is the Chianina Florentine steak. Nikola and Mateo, our server, were very attentive to our needs and provided very good recommendations. They have a great, welcoming, and friendly personality which made the eating experience so much better.
Nikola served a Tuscan balsamic vinegar called “12 Anni Condimento Balsamico Etrusco” and recommends trying it on everything to see if we like it. The olive oil served with it is “Poggio Alle Mura”, an olio extra Virgin olive oil which tasted like wine. These two bottles utterly stunned me as to how good they were. I will never look at balsamic vinegar and olive oil the same way again. This place has already raised the bar for my husband and I and we haven’t even been served our first course yet!
We started off with several appetizers. The first was a small cup of salami with a bed of artichoke. It was a bit sour and the moisture coming from it accents the natural flavor of the salami.
The next one is fried pizza pasta served with different types of salami meat and cream cheese. My husband quickly expressed his enjoyment of this dish. He excitedly took the fried pizza pasta ball and cut it open and inserted a salami meat with a glob of cream cheese.
The amazing combination of the softness with a crisp outside coming from the pasta ball with the salty salami and cold and creamy cheese was just heavenly. The combination of flavors and textures were delightfully shocking.
Our other appetizer was chicken liver and tomatoes on bruschetta. The tomato flavor was so fresh. When we added balsamic vinegar onto the bruschetta, the flavors just exploded. It was so incredibly delicious.
Our next course is the primi course which consisted of two types of local Florentine pastas. The restaurant served it as though it was made for sharing as they automatically split the two different pastas onto two plates. I appreciate that convenience and gesture. They didn’t even look bothered when we requested to share the pasta plates. The staff did a great job in keeping the environment cool and relaxed.
One of the pasta plates was tortellini served with white boar sauce. This was a very meaty and heavy dish with the tortellini being filled with cheese too. It is lusciously saucy while the melted cheese inside the pasta seems to melt down whenever I take a bite. My dish only has two big pieces of tortellini. At first glance, I thought it wasn’t enough. But when I took the first bite, it was so rich and heavy that I was glad I only had a couple of pieces. It was exceedingly enjoyable and succulent. The other pasta dish is flat noodles with truffle and mushroom. The noodles are soft to chew and tastes quite well with the mushroom and truffle flavors. The next course is the secondi of which we were served red wine in preparation for the incoming steak experience. The wine brought was the Brunello di Montalcino.Castello Banfi from 2010. It was a very good dry red wine with 14% alcohol.
“It was an authentic Bistecca di Chianina, a special breed of Tuscan cow that provides a legendary steak quality that is incredibly soft and tender.”
When the steak arrived, it came in sizzling on a cast iron skillet. The steak was huge. I mean, it is a full kilogram worth of steak! It was an authentic Bistecca di Chianina, a special breed of Tuscan cow that provides a legendary steak quality that is incredibly soft and tender. It is also quite a fatty steak unobtrusively distributed throughout the meat which hints of its high quality. The flavor and texture matches that. The size may be quite intimidating but it’s certainly do-able – just take your time and use the hot skillet to heat up the meat a bit before eating it. But be careful, the steak is meant to be served rare as the texture and flavor is best at that state. Use the skillet only to heat up the meat, not to cook it further. The steak came with three tasty sauces to give each bite a different kick. Since the steak is so enormous, the sauces keep the steak exciting throughout the meal. This was also served with a side of grilled vegetables and potatoes. The potatoes were well cooked as the outer layer was crispy and the inner was very soft. The skillet is still quite hot after having finished the steak half way. It’s fantastic how it keeps the steak warm so that it can still be a pleasant experience. I would imagine that since it’s such an enormous steak, keeping it at the best temperature throughout the meal is a huge challenge. This restaurant delivers it perfectly. My husband couldn’t get enough of this steak and exclaims that this was the best steak of his life!
Eventually we were very full from the meal but there is always room for dessert! We were served a dessert wine called Granello, Barone Ricasoli from 2014.
We had the chocolate mousse with gelato which was an enjoyable and worthy dessert that closed our palette off for the evening.
It was around 10:30 p.m. when we were finishing up our meal when we noticed more guests are still coming in to have dinner.
“The tourists and locals love this place and we definitely understand why!”
If you have only one restaurant to try in Florence that highpoints the local Florentine’s meat-loving culture, this would definitely be it!
Thanks to Trattoria Osteria Dall’Oste | Via Luigi Alamanni, 3, 50100 Firenze, Italy | +39 055 212048