For Cacio e Pepe, they don’t even use cream; the sauce is made from the pasta water and cheese mixed together. I first tried it at a restaurant, but it was so good I had to learn to make it myself. My homemade version actually came out pretty solid (and I didn’t burn it, so that’s a win).
Supplì are hand-shaped, breaded, and fried every morning. Roman pizza has a thinner, crispier crust than what we are used to in the United States. It’s baked in long rectangular pans, so you can order it by the slice instead of the whole pie. Even Gelato shops make their own flavors daily using milk, nuts, and fruits from local farms.
A lot of what you eat here literally comes from just outside the city. The tomatoes, olive oil, basil and cheese are all local. Rome’s weather is kind of like the southern U.S., with hot summers and mild winters, which is perfect for growing all these ingredients.
Back home in Massachusetts, I love seafood, but most of our food comes from grocery stores or is shipped in. Here, everything feels like it’s part of the land and the people. It’s wild how much of a difference that makes in taste.
Another big difference I noticed is portion size. In Italy, the portions are smaller, but you still leave feeling full.
