Many renowned dining destinations have hosted the annual “food Oscars” – the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list. This year is the first time the honour goes to Italy, with Turin, capital of Piedmont, holding the ceremony on 19 June. Although Emilia-Romagna is usually regarded as the country’s food capital, Piedmont has a proud gastronomic tradition, with white truffles, rice, chocolate, pastas and cheeses, not to mention wines such as barolo and barbaresco.
Greener than most Italian cities, Turin, the former capital of Savoy and briefly capital of Italy, also has elegant piazzas, royal palaces, possibly Europe’s biggest outdoor market and the wide Po River for strolling, cycling and kayaking. It is where vermouth (see below), grissini breadsticks and espresso coffee were invented.
Given that few visitors can afford the high-end dining the 50 Best contenders offer, I asked Savio Losito, co-founder of app Unexpected Italy, to show me places across Turin where a visitor can plug into its food scene without spending €100 a head.
Latteria Bera
Chiara Franzoso’s grandmother and great aunts opened this dairy in Turin’s historic centre in 1958 to offer city dwellers fresh milk from the surrounding hills. That function is less vital these days, but Chiara keeps up her relationship with small producers, stocking a huge range of fresh and aged cow, goat and sheep cheeses as well as charcuterie specialities I had never seen, such as cooked salami. UK visitors may be surprised to see locals popping in for her most popular dairy product – fresh cream whipped with sugar and vanilla in an antique mixer and served in little pots – like ice-cream – with nuts, chocolate or a dollop of warm zabaglione.
Takeaway trays and tastings from €8.50.
Scannabue
Turin classics such as carne cruda (beef tartare), vitello tonnato (veal in creamy tuna mayonnaise), stuffed pasta and braised cheek with mash are found on hundreds of menus. This city institution does them all beautifully, but adds innovative dishes such as goat’s cheese with almonds and house-dried tomatoes, and marinated artichokes. Boss Paolo Fantini advises us to eat the plin (rectangular pinched ravioli) with a spoon to enjoy the rich butter sauce; risotto with parmesan, lemon and bone marrow is equally oozy. I’m also struck by the friendly atmosphere: Paolo checking a waitress isn’t stressed, and joshing with a young sommelier.
Two-course lunch with wine or dessert from €15.
Le Vitel Étonné
The name is a French/Piedmontese pun by founder Luisa Pandolfi, making vitello tonnato (vitel tonné in dialect) sound like “astonished veal”. That may pass anglophone diners by, but the meat is exemplary – cooked for nine hours at just 52C. Head chef Massimiliano Brunetto’s other antipasti include tripe salad (nicer than it sounds), anchovies with green and red sauce, and wonderful stuffed courgette flowers in rice batter. We continue with local pastas: tajarín (handcut ribbons) carbonara style with asparagus and guanciale; and agnolotti (like ravioli too) stuffed with veal, beef and pork and served with roasting juices.
Two courses from about €30. On 1 July they are opening a takeaway pasta shop up the road.
Antiche Sere
The name of this restaurant in a residential district west of the centre means “ancient evenings” and a summer dinner under the vine-covered pergola does feel like being in a book or film, particularly when chef Daniele Rota emerges to greet and joke with customers. Traditional in the best way, it is run by his sister Antonella plus several family members, and the hand-written menu includes all the favourites plus ribstickers such as pork shank with potatoes, and rabbit stew in white wine. I particularly like the “electric” tomini cheeses, with chilli-spiked green herb sauce.
Two courses from €22.
Fratelli Bruzzone
Brother-and-sister team Martina and Gabriele Bruzzone took a love of food learned from their grandparents and opened a deli that evolved into this 30-seat restaurant (40 including the street outside). As well as Turin classics, they offer several welcome plant-based dishes. I start with porcini mushrooms in a fujot (the ceramic dish with candle used to keep bagna cauda warm) plus a plate of giardiniera pickled vegetables and a salad with fermented fennel. Plin with goat ricotta and asparagus keep up the meat-free theme. New to mark the 50 Best launch are house-made apricot or cherry ice lollies – refreshing and singing of summer fruit.
Two courses from €20. Booking essential.
Ristorante Consorzio
This dark, intimate restaurant is widely admired for Sicilian chef Valentina Chiaramonte’s modern twists – “I take the history and make it into a novel,” she says – and its strict insistence on organic and natural wines. A snail symbol on the menu denotes Slow Food-registered dishes. Pleased to see some meat-light options, I enjoy a crispy egg on braised chard, then grilled asparagus with pea cream and pine nuts. Savio takes one for the team by ordering its famed offal selection – pig’s foot, brain salad, confit lung and grilled matrice (cow’s vagina). I take his word that it’s good.
Two courses from €32.
Caffè dell’Orologio
On evenings in the riverside San Salvario district, this piola (dialect for osteria) serves a mostly cold merenda sinoira, the traditional Piedmont country supper that co-founder Lorenzo Coscia remembers his grandparents eating. It’s a relief to find not all Italian meals are elaborate multi-course affairs. From a regularly changing “small plates” menu we choose tasty potato croquettes, marinated onions, thinly sliced tongue with tomato and pepper sauce, rabbit liver paté and fresh tomini cheeses with herby sauce. The wine list is 100% Piedmontese. Open all afternoon, this is a handy spot for visitors with children who get hungry before restaurants are open.
Dishes from €4.
Gelateria Aria
There are ice-cream parlours all over this city. Many swear by award winner Mara dei Boschi, but with branches also in Milan and Barolo, it is no longer a small producer. Aria, in the studenty Vanchiglia district, was opened in 2022 by Roberto Speranza, who worked all over Italy and in Paris before returning to Piedmont and naming his gelateria after its main ingredient – the air beaten into gelato. His ice-creams “tell the story of the region”, using small local producers of saffron, mountain honey, hazelnuts and olive oil. Flavours include liquorice-and-violet “Il Senateur”, as favoured by statesman Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, and a popular popcorn and caramel.
Toc
Turin and chocolate have gone together since a Savoy duke married a Spanish princess and gained access to new world imports. Turin cooks may have been the first to mix cacao with sugar to make bars. Today, the city is full of big-name chocolate shops, most of them now on an industrial scale. For something truly artisanal, we head to the gentrifying Borgo Nuovo district, where former publishing exec Paolo Lovisolo and his staff of six offer top-quality chocolates handmade daily. His wares, with salted caramel, pistachio, orange peel and even – deliciously – rosemary, should all be eaten within three weeks.
Eccetera Bar
Perhaps not surprisingly given its rich food, Turin led the world in creating aperitifs. A fine place to learn their history is this bar a few streets from the river. Genial owner Nicola Piazza uses his 20 years of drinks industry experience to take us through the origins of vermouth: how adding bitter herbs to wine stimulates saliva production and “opens” the stomach. We taste three vermouths neat, including a special-edition Martini “di Torino”, then make three cocktails, including one named after a gin-loving 19th-century count called … Negroni. For me, Cocchi vermouth with sparkling water is better than any Aperol spritz.
Vermouth Voyage €45pp
Where to stay
Landscape designer Giuliana Marsiaj opened B&B Look TO (doubles from €180) in 2019, in an 1830s palazzo overlooking vast Piazza Vittorio Veneto and walking distance from Porta Nuova station and the river. Eschewing the tasteful neutrals of many Turin interiors, she has decked out the two guest sitting rooms in, respectively, rich dark teal and glowing red, and the breakfast room in sunny yellow. The four bedrooms are named after flowers: the largest, Giglio (lily), has a red marble bathroom and a tropical flower mural in the shower.
Accommodation was provided by Look TO; find venue details on the Turin section of app Unexpected Italy.