11/05/2026: 🍝 - Food: 3/5
🛎️ - Service 4/5
📍 - Location & atmosphere 4/5
Rome is a city of brutal extremes, and honestly, that’s how I like it. You either want to be hunched over a scarred wooden table in a gloriously greasy, chaotic trattoria where the house red tastes like ink and the waiter hates your guts, or you want the full-blown, transcendental wizardry of Heinz Beck. Anything in between? That’s where the trouble starts.
My quest for the "New Roman Soul" ended behind the Pantheon at La Ciambella. On paper, it’s a dream. The space is a vault of impeccable taste—all soaring stone arches and soft lighting, a sleek, surgical atelier where Roman classics are dissected with high-end ambition. The wine list is a genuine love letter to the peninsula, and the service is a well-oiled machine, professional to a fault.
But here's the rub: you can’t cook the soul out of a city and expect it to still move you.
I started with the Wrap con porchetta di maialino da latte. The staff described it as "delicate." In my book, "delicate" is a word for lace doilies, not porchetta. To me, it was practically invisible. When you see the word porchetta on a menu, you expect a punch to the jaw—salt, fat, garlic, the wild taste of the countryside. Instead, I got a polite wrap where the marinated cherry tomatoes and yoghurt sauce felt like unnecessary bystanders to a ghost of a pig.
The one flickering light in the dark was the Maritozzo with creamed cod and lime. This was a clever, cheeky bit of business. Taking a pillowy, sweet breakfast staple and weaponising it with salt cod so smooth it defies the laws of physics? That worked. The lime cut through the richness like a switchblade. It was a brilliant opening act, but it unfortunately left the stage quiet.
I pinned my last hopes on the namesake Ciambella con la Crema. I wanted a riot. I wanted that heavy, sugary, warm hug for the stomach that justifies the calories. What I got was more "lightness"—technical, airy, and ultimately, hollow.
It’s not a bad meal. It’s technically sound, and in a neighborhood where you’re usually dodging frozen pizza and neon-colored gelato, it’s a dignified escape. But dignity doesn't satisfy a craving. I didn't find the new soul of Rome here; I found a very expensive, very beautiful silence.
If you want the heart of this city, you’re better off looking where the floor is sticky or the stars are Michelin-rated. This middle ground is just too polite for its own good.
11/05/2026: Each time I visit Rome, I eat here. Once again, absolutely superb. Wonderful food, amazingly good wines from small producers, the most excellent and enthusiastic sommelier and great service. A must go.
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