Trattoria La Torre

THIS is why we traveled to Italy.
What a fantastic little family-​run place. The server comes to your table and points out fresh pasta made minutes ago. Then you’re offered various sauces and accompaniments. We had pork-​filled tortellini with Bolognese sauce and it was kick-​ass great.
Then the sever shows up again and offers three or four different meats prepared various ways. We had roasted duck and also a roasted pork served in red wine sauce that sent us to gastronomic heaven.
All this washed down with a carafe of house chianti. Then the server offers several dolce choices. We had soft and hard biscotti, both good.
There’s no written menu of any kind. The staff is fast and friendly, the place noisy and cheerful, the food wonderful, and then overall experience our best meal in two weeks in Italy.

Diese kleine Trattoria ist ein kleines «Einraumristorante» in einer Seitensgasse des Campo. Das Lokal hat den Charakter eines kleinen sienesischen Kellers.
Es gab frishe Pasta, die dicht des Eingangs herstestellt wurde. Offenbar schätzen dies auch einheimische.
Gern wäre ich über dieses kultige Ristorante begeistert gewesen, doch ist sachlich festzustellen, dass wir alle Speisen — es gab einige Vergleiche, denn wir waren als Grüppchen dort — von der Pasta (etwas enttäuschend, u.a. zu weich, Sossen zu säuerlich) bis zum Secondo (durchaus gut) anderswo zum gleichen Preis, in gepflegterem Ambiente deutlich besser bekommen haben. Wirklich günstig isst man hier eben auch nicht.
Dennoch ist dieses Ristorante im Zentrum Sienas durchaus eine originelle Alternative zu den überteuerten Touristen-​Schuppen.

Complete surprise — our tour guide, Linda, took us to this treasure for lunch. The wild boar sauce, ravioli’s, a cookies– were wonderful. The owners were welcoming and help make our experience in Siena very enjoyable.

Stay off the square and eat here. It’s one tiny block down on the left through a beaded curtain. Extremely easy to miss!
From Southern CA originally so used to very, very high quality, well prepared, fresh, regional Italian food (read: not red sauce and cheese) all over the place. Trattoria La Torre is absolutely as good as this type of Italian food gets. Simple, faultless, delicious.
Tagliatelle (hand made) with bolognese as flavorful, fresh and delightful as you’ll have anywhere.
Veal osso bucco the same.
Cannot recommend highly enough. You may wait a bit since there is the owner, the cook (wife?) and one server when we were in, all running around with their heads cut off. Very reasonable considering the quality and just a touch more expensive than other place serving boxed pasta with inferior sauces.
Best pasta dish I had in Italy.
All Italian locals the afternoon we were there.

Most of the restaurant’s lining Siena’s Il Campo will provide you with a great view of the town square, but little punch when it comes to food quality.
In contrast, Trattoria La Torre («The Tower Restaurant»), located, as promised by the name, just a few steps off the square in the alley just behind the campo’s tower, actually offers fresh, home-​cooked meals.
I walked in hungry, and was greeted to a hospitable staff, and a rustic interior that appears to have remained largely unchanged since the Middle Ages during Siena’s city-​state days.
As testament to their commitment to fresh food, they have no printed menus; instead, a waiter will explain what they have on hand that day. Note that they do have a handwritten menu (Italian only) posted outside by the entrance. You may want to take a gander at it before entering, because you won’t find it again once inside.
They had several types of pasta, all of which appear to be freshly made. (You can even see the pasta machine by the kitchen.) I went with Cinghiale (long, flat pasta, a little thinner than fettuccine) cooked with meat sauce, and for my vegetable, garlic spinach (which came a-​plenty, flavored lightly).
For my second plate I got roasted pigeon (Piccione), which was the most exotic thing they had (and at € 15, also the most expensive). A bit smaller than a hen, the meat was exceptionally tender, the flavoring pleasant but not overbearing. Everything had a very home-​cooked feel to it.
The majority of dishes are priced at a fair € 8 – 10. Expect to pay around € 20 per person (sans drinks).
Conveniently located at the heart of Siena, and serving real food, I’d say La Torre is a frontrunner one of the best spots for lunch or dinner in town.

Amazing pasta! Very hole in the wall hidden gem family feel. Very nice staff/​owner and had the best pasta and best Sienese cookies ever! We came in after 10pm and they sat us and gave excellent advice on what to order and how to properly eat it! The place has been written about in the NYT in the past so you know it is legit!

We had a wonderful meal here, beautiful food, beautifully presented, wonderful welcoming staff/​owners who made the food themselves. We have remembered this place and talked about it for seven years.

Even years after we ate here as a family reunion in Italy — we still talk about that meal in Siena at Trattoria La Torre! Treat yourself. This is what eating in Italy is all about. Let the owner order for you. Go hungry and go big — eat all the courses, but if you can only choose one — don’t skip the pasta! Enjoy the atmosphere and hospitality. I’m jealous you’re reading this as a possible referral to eat here — so just go, wait however long might be necessary (high season can be busy) and be ready to make a memory! Salute!

This was the best meal I’ve had in Italy, hands down. I cannot recommend this place strongly enough. It’s quaint, charming, and delicious. The service is incredibly quick, the selections broad, and the food to die for.

Like Kristin U. said, this place is hard to find. It’s a short turn off the palazzo or main town square, in an alleyway that’s closer to the tower side. It is definitely a tiny, family-​run business. So my husband and I KNEW we were in for a treat. We were on the hunt for home-​cooked meals in Italy, not so much the fancy pants stuff.
We had read great things about this place in Rick Steves’ book. So we immediately went to La Torre for our first Sienese meal. It was getting close to 3pm when the restaurant closed for lunch, and we were STARVING. We sat down, and realized no one really spoke English. The owner is an older gentleman who’s like your no-​BS-​Italian G-​pa. He started spitting out the menu in Italian to us. The only words we recognized were «ravioli» and «tortellini». So we repeated those words and then he slowly spoke some other Italian words and we just nodded.
Literally 2 MINUTES LATER, we had both dishes with a red, home-​cooked meat sauce on our table and chianti for both us (along with the canteen of chianti for seconds and thirds). We were impressed by the speed at which the food came out and since we were starving, we devoured our plates in 5 minutes. This became one of our favorite Italian restaurants (the other one being Gatto, also in Siena).
The delicacy of the pasta blew us away. It was indescribably good. The meat sauce was perfect — not too salty or heavy. There was Parmesan you could sprinkle on yourself. There were about 3 workers in the restaurant, one lady and another middle-​aged man. They had fresh handmade pasta sitting out on the table, that was green, red and beige. It took us a long time to figure out what these things were because they just looked like chips or veggie chips on a table.
The owner came back to our table and asked if we wanted a secondi. We were confused at what he was asking us, and STUFFED, so we refused. He looked disappointed, but left our table and started prepping the staff’s lunch. They popped open a new bottle of wine and it looked like they were going to have a grand delicious feast together — like a real Italian style family meal.
The bill was EXTREMELY CHEAP. I think roughly 20 euros. Crazy. We returned a second time to La Torre because we loved it so much — this time we looked up the menu that was just outside the restaurant, and figured out what we wanted before ordering. We ordered the pici cinghiale (wild boar w/​fat thick noodles) and gnocchi — BOTH WERE TO DIE FOR. The gnocchi had an absolutely perfect consistency and just melted in your mouth. The tagliatelle was also amazing. Once again we ordered chianti and to top off our meals, we had the tiramisu — UNBELIEVABLE. It was the BEST tiramisu my husband and I ever had. The bill again was very cheap (29 euros).
We got some nasty looks from the owner because we didn’t order a secondi or salad (the last part of an Italian meal) — but that is the CHARM of the place and owner. We heard he treated a famous pop star the same way as he treated others, despite this singer’s status.
Last thing, it was really funny because the second time we went back, we saw another couple experiencing the same type of confusion as we experienced, as the owner started spouting off all the dishes in Italian. They didn’t comprehend a thing he said. They tried speaking English, but he would respond in Italian. So they ended up with 2 pasta dishes, 2 meat dishes, 2 salads, and wine and bread. Ahhh I can still taste their dishes in my mind and will never see Italian food the same way.

I went to Trattoria La Torre about ten days ago with my boyfriend, his sisters, and one sister’s fiancé. The restaurant was highly recommend by Rick Steves and other sources, so it was my goal to make that our destination for our meal in Siena. It was definitely hard to find, as it was down a tiny side street that almost didn’t look like a street.
Inside was very cozy, and you could tell it was a family-​run establishment. We had the menu recited to us before each course (I don’t even know if they have written menus), and we could see the food being prepared in the open kitchen. The food was fresh and came quickly. I tasted cheese and spinach ravioli with a light butter sauce and the gnocchi pomodoro. The sauce on the ravioli was light and not greasy at all. The gnocchi were just the way I like them — like small clouds that practically melt in your mouth. For my secondi, I had roast chicken. The portion was large and was possibly the tastiest chicken I’ve ever had. The rest of the group had fish that was prepared very simply — lightly fried with some lemon — and raved about it. I had a contorni of a tomato-​zucchini stew that was a little salty, but full of flavor, and the veggies were super fresh.
The restaurant is not cheap, but it’s not expensive, either, and I think that you definitely get your money’s worth for the value, ambiance, and experience. It’s the kind of place I would go back to before trying somewhere new.

KULT am allerbesten für Touristen, die kein italienisch sprechen und sich völlig zum Depp machen ich hatte das Glück einer blonden (!) Begleiterin, die des Italienischen mächtig ist ein besseres Bistecca alla fiorentina hatte ich bisher noch nicht. Reservierung empfohlen !