Borgo Antico

This was the best place we found to eat at in Firenze. We had salads and pizza. Very busy place we had our hotel make a reservation.

We were exploring the area and by chance found Borgo Antico. It was raining out and we were hungry! We were about ten minutes early for lunch hours, but the nice staff sat us quickly anyways and gave us bread to munch on before official lunch hours started. Ten minutes later we ordered the tomato and buffalo mozzarella pizza and we swear it’s the best pizza we’ve ever tasted. Fresh ingredients, lots of cheese and basil and a great crust. (P.S. After the fact, when we checked into our Airbnb, our host said it’s one of his favorite places for pizza. And he’s a local!) Go here!

Stopped by here to relax in the patio and just have a caffe in the afternoon, then ended up staying for dinner and drinks as well. Wonderful patio seating with a nice view of Pza. Santo Spirito, and shade (as well as heaters above if it gets too chilly). You can always eat inside too if you really want to…
Tried a few of the white glass options, but the red house wine was the best (Chianti option), and the pasta to pair it with was absolutely fantastic. Strongly recommend the carbonara or wild boar pappardelle (see the pics). If you’re looking for somewhere to relax and just start a dinner a bit early, and to get away from the normal touristy spots, this should definitely be one of your first choices.

Great pizza and the hamburger is too big to bite into. Loved the warm atmosphere and location. Fairly priced.

1 word: delicious! I spoke to the chefs who were friendly and deeply passionate about the food the make. Nothing but the best and freshest ingredients are used. The menu is extensive so everyone in your party will find something they like. Also, request outdoor seating; you won’t regret it!

Simply delicious. Everything you would expect from a restaurant in Florence. Highly recommend all pasta dishes and the fresh and delicious salads! House wine is a bonus!

Wait staff was nice. Food was good not great. Charged 2 coperto per person so that was dissapointing (tax for being a tourist)

I bookmarked so many places to eat in Florence, but in the end, we only had 2 short days… And our best meal was not even on my list!
We stayed close to Plaza Santo Spirito and walked past it multiple times every day. For our last meal in Florence, we decided not to trek over the river and just have a simple meal in Santo Spirito. The restaurants in Santo Spirito were packed, with mostly study abroad students and tourists — so naturally I viewed the area as a tourist trap. Our first choice, Osteria Gusto, seemed like a painfully endless wait. So we walked next door to Borgo Antico which had no line, no queue.
I had low expectations the moment I sat down among a roomful of Americans.
We got free bread and a plate of pitted olives. The olives were not fancy but hit the spot.
We got house wine. And we really really liked it.
«I have a feeling that it’s going to be great,» said Husband.
Then came my big and surprisingly fresh salad.
Next came Husband’s Florentine steak, with roasted potatoes. Amazing. Flawless.
BEST MEAL IN ITALY.
And we almost missed it.

Simple, basic and very well executed. Started as «Plan C» (if not Plan D) in the face of August closures, but this quickly became my family’s go-​to Firenze destination. We went back three times, sampled most of the menu, and came up with winners every time. Pizzas were flavorful, pastas delightful, and the bistecca alla fiorentina was very well executed. The salumi plate and shellfish antipasti were real standouts, and even the biscotti and caffè (corretto!) were excellent. Friendly and helpful staff, pleasant ambiance on the square, it was a delightful Florentine experience.

This place is in the center of Plaza Santo Spirito. In this area there are several restaurants and bars, it’s a courtyard win the church in the center front and in the middle of court yard people hang out, dance to old 50s music. People are drinking and smoking, just hanging out. This restaurant is average, however staff was really nice and attentive. We arrived 10 minutes before the kitchen was closing and the staff let us in to order our meals, very nice.
I recommend coming here for a fun atmosphere and friendly staff experience.

Excellent accueil, rapport qualité-​prix impeccable, un bon negroni, un verre de classico chianti, et le tour est joué. Le seul bémol: un peu bruyant dans la petite salle du fond s’il y a du monde.

The service was very quick, and the food is delicious! Not too crowded for lunch, and the prices are moderate — 8 € for a plate of spaghetti. The food was delicious, and the staff speaks decent English for travelers. I recommend!

This was my favorite meal while in Florence. The florentine style steak and pizza were top quality. Service was great. Great location as well.

This place was great
Away from the crowd
The Gorgonzola pizza and the risotto were amazing
Good service and their house wine was almost champagne but good
Will definitely go back !

It was decent although there are much better restaurants in the area that I would check out first.

I’m back in Italy! Woo! Three weeks! You better believe I’m going to Unilocal the Unilocal out of this place! That worked better in my head… anyway I’m back and had a mediocre dinner on my first night back. That said, I was so hungry I probably would have eaten anything. My colleague had also not eaten that day, so we made the mistake of going out around 5 p.m. for dinner. We should have known better, but when you’re hungry, logic doesn’t work.
We walked to the first place he wanted to try. Closed. Opens at 7 p.m. The second place. Closed. Opens at 7 p.m. So we walked around the corner into the Piazza and saw a number of places with diners having a bite to eat outside. We decided on Borgo Antico because they seemed to have a decent crowd of people, so we thought it had be ok. Our first waiter was very attentive, spoke English, lovely. I went for pizza. The Quattro Stagione. It is my pizza. Artichokes, mushrooms, olives, and ham. It would be better if they mixed all of it, but I am aware that the layout is based on the title.
We also had a litre of the house red and a bottle of sparkling water. The pizzas were huge, but they weren’t the best I’ve had. Cover charge was 2 euro per person. We also had dessert, my colleague was supposed to have just one scoop of chocolate gelato, but ended up with a sundae. And I, on the recommendation of our waiter, ordered the cheesecake.
At some point our waiter changed. The cheesecake was the best part of my dinner. Seriously. It is a bit more yellow than what you see in the states, but I have a feeling that had to do with the use of more egg yolk. It was so creamy, but not in a dense way and it has a lovely, balanced cream cheese flavor. And it tasted like they used Amaretti cookies for the crust. I give the cheesecake five stars and I would go back just for dessert… hell, I’ll buy a whole one to take back to my apartment. Seriously. After that, my colleague had asked for the check, but it never came. He tried to get the attention of our new waiter, but he just seemed to be avoiding us. In the end, a different waitress had to bring us our check.
Go for cheesecake, but stop around the corner at Gusto Pizza for pizza.

Located on a relatively quiet piazza, Santo Spirito, Borgo Antico is a wonderful spot to have lunch al fresco on a nice day. We had just climbed the Duomo and were about to explore the Biboli gardens when we stopped here for lunch.
The two pizzas we ordered with quite good with a nice thin crust and an especially flavorful tomato base. A pasta with clams offering was also well liked. And a spinach salad was excellent with its mix of spinach and regular lettuce with shavings of parmesan and laced with balsamic glaze.
The food, service and the location just hit the spot for a nice midday meal while touring this gorgeous city.

This place was recomended to us from a local girl who made us walk from the center of Firenze but it was worth it tipical outdoor trattoria food was great appetizers were great it was a plate of Ham with some olive and crustinis with tomatoes our main dish was the Steak of Fiorentina came with potatoes the wine is very cheap!!!

This place ruined our evening. After we ordered coffee, food and beer, we wanted to relax a bit more and ordered another beer and they refused to serve us only beer as they said that we had to order more food in order to be served more drinks. It’s a tourist trap.
It was simply a tactic to kick us out because we had already spent money and they wanted to sit new customers. I realized the restaurant was busy but that’s no way to treat any customer after they have already spent money. It’s not what’s expected of a restaurant, you should be able to stay and relax if you so choose to.
(Try ZaZa instead, they’re cheaper and the food is way better and they have an awesome outdoor seating area that is huge. I really loved their apple tart. Also their lamb and roasted potato dish is amazing and an excellent value.)
The thing is that we still intended to order dessert and more coffee, but instead we got up and left feeling like crap. They want you to eat and run and have no regard whatsoever for their customers.
The food is not even good. The pizza sauce is bland. They also charge 2.00 per person as cover charge plus 10% service charge. They really nickel and dime you and then they end up practically kicking you out. It was very disappointing and unpleasant. They should be grateful to be getting tourist but have no appreciation for them.

Wie alle Lokale auf der Piazza S. Spirito ist das Borgo Antico ein von amerikanischen Tourischwärmen heimgesuchter Tourinap. Bei indiskutablen Service kann man eine Kleinigkeit auf einem schönen Platz trinken, sollte allerdings die Kochkünste über einen Snack hinaus nicht überstrapazieren.

Great place with excelent pizza!
We found this place walking around Florence and trying to walk away from the tourist spots.
This restaurant is located at the Piazza di Santo Spirito, a great place to sit down take a break and get some cold beer.
We ordered couple of cappuccinos, I just cant get enough of them in Italy.
Then we got couple of Spritz cocktalis with some of their delicious olives and bread.
For main dish we got the mushroom pizza… Now we do have some great pizza in New York, but I loved the pizza in Florence. The dough is a bit different, thin flavourful and crispy on the bottom, and although I had some more pizza on couple of different places I did never get a greasy slice of pizza.
Great place! I wish I had more time to come back and try their other dishes on the menu.
4.5 stars for Borgo Antico.

Our host in Florence recommended this place and so I was clearly excited to try it.
Overall it was okay. Not amazing and most things turned out to be a bit bland. Around the table we ordered a calzone, soup of the day and the pasta with duck. I love duck meat but was surprised at how much salt and cheese I had to add to it to bring out the flavor. Same went for the white bean soup. (which turned out to be amazing after some salt and cheese) The calzone was pretty much just bread with a bit of filling.
For some reason I am stil hopeful for this place. The atmosphere is great and the service was fantastic. Maybe it was an off night or perhaps we just ordered the wrong meals.

Das Borgo Antico wird — zu Recht — in anderen Foren häufig als Geheimtipp gehandelt. Und ist daher natürlich keiner mehr, wie sollte es in einer Touristenhochburg wie Firenze auch anders sein. Aber — wenn auch touristisch gut gefüllt, stimmen Preis, Qualität und typisch ländliche Piazza-​Atmosphäre mitten in Florenz in dieser Trattoria. Die Speisekarte plus das Tagesangebot ist etwas zu umfangreich und zwingt einen, spontan zu entscheiden, aber in der Regel ist alles eine gute Wahl. Unser Tipp: nach ausgiebigem Essen im Borgo Antico noch einen Drink aus einem der diversen Kioske holen und einfach das abendlich-​nächtliche Treiben auf der Piazza Santo Spirito geniessen.

Es gibt sie wirklich — gastronomische Plätze in Florenz, an denen man sich niederlassen kann, ohne das Portemonnaie vorher am Geldautomaten kräftig aufgefüllt zu haben!
Wer sich durch die Touristenmassen in dieser Stadt gekämpft hat (man selber ist ja bekanntlich nie Tourist), schon in einem Café ein Vermögen los geworden ist, endlich den Magen beruhigen möchte und eine Erfrischung braucht, der sollte auf die Piazza Santo Spirito zusteuern. Nomen est Omen — der Heilige Geist sorgt hier dafür, dass der Nepp keinen Zugang hat.
Obwohl recht zentral gelegen wirkt dieser Platz sehr viel ruhiger, authentischer, die Hektik fällt ab. Mehrere Restaurants gruppieren sich, wir ließen uns in diesem nieder. Meine Frau hatte den Tipp mitgebracht von einer Exkursion, die sie vor einigen Jahren nach Florenz gemacht hatte.
Angesichts des guten Wetters ließen wir uns draußen nieder, große Sonnendächer schützen vor der Sonne. Für unsere Kleingruppe wurden gleich zwei Tische zusammengeschoben und eingedeckt. Hübsche geflochtene Stühle, die insbesonders unsere 2-​jährige Enkelin als Spielzeug entdeckte, kann man doch so schön die kleinen Finger durch die Löcher stecken.
Die junge Bedienung erzählte uns (neben der umfangreichen Speisenkarte, die wir sofort erhielten) einige Empfehlungen. Angesichts der am Nebentisch servierten Pizzen, deren Durchmesser alleine uns schon beim Zusehen satt machte, bestellten wir eine Pizza für zwei, zwei Salate und ein Nudelgericht. Dazu ein kühler Rose-​Wein und das obligatorische Wasser zum Abkühlen. Zum Abschluss dann Café (wie in Italien der Espresso heißt). Alles schmeckte lecker, war frisch zubereitet und wie gesagt — ausreichend!
Auf die Rechnung mussten wir etwas länger warten, aber was macht das schon im Urlaub. Dafür war sie dann erfreulicher Weise nicht astronomisch, sondern die Preise bewegten sich durchaus im angemessenen Rahmen.
Als wir gegen ein Uhr kamen, waren die Außentische sehr gut besetzt. Als wir gegen halb drei gingen, gab es jede Menge Platz. Empfehlung daher (sofern der Magen nicht knurrt): Antizyklisch herkommen, dann hat man eine ganz entspannte Essenszeit.
Das von mir gemachte, hier eingestellte Foto ist nun wirklich nicht berauschend, es war halt ein Schnellschuss aus der Hüfte. Die Web-​Seite dieser Trattoria hat jedoch jede Menge wunderschöné Fotos — schaut einfach mal hinein!