Lucia Ferretti

I was born in Testaccio — the neighbourhood in Rome that is built on a hill of broken ancient amphorae and is home to what I will argue is the best food market and the most honest restaurants in the city. My grandmother cooked cacio e pepe by feel, never by measurement. I know which trattoria in Trastevere is genuinely old and which is a replica installed in 2012 to look old, which Roman pizza al taglio is worth the 20-minute detour, and where to eat supplì that is actually hot. Rome's food is ancient and specific and almost nothing sold to tourists has anything to do with it.