Enoteca Pinchiorri

The food is good, and the service is outstanding, but this place is sooooo over-​priced. It’s got 3 Michelin stars and a length wine list and they are milking it for all it’s worth. I think you can get better food in Florence and elsewhere for ¼ the price, and skip the pomp and circumstance.
Well worth skipping.

Worst service ever. I was put on the waiting list for July 2^nd, which is today and I also have a confirmed reservation on July 10^th (just in case I could not dine in on July 2^nd). I called this restaurant to see if anyone cancel their reservations today, the woman picked the phone told me no one canceled their reservation. Then I said I would go there on July 10^th. She said I did not have a reservation. I said I had a reservation and the guy took my credit card number over the phone to confirm it. She told me the guy is named Alessandro (or a name that sounds similar), he works at 3pm. So around 4 pm I had my professor (she is local) called this restaurant, the guy Alessandro picked up the phone and told my professor I made a mistake and I misunderstood what he told me, he said didn’t make a reservation for me he put me on a waiting list. My professor told Alessandro in italian that he was lying, because she was the one that made the reservation for me, and I also confirmed it as well. My professor told Alessandro that he just canceled my reservation because he gave my table to a group of people so they can make more money, Alessandro was shocked because my professor was spot on. I hate it that Enoteca Pinchiorri is so dishonest, tried to fool and deceived customers and blamed the mistakes on them. Who knows what they might put on their food, probably drop them on the floor and still serve them to their customers.

I would like to give this restaurant 4.5 stars.
A million stars should go to the chef, who was one of the most incredible michelin starred chefs we have eaten from across Europe and North America.
We did one of the smaller tasting menus– 6 courses for myself, while my husband ordered a la carte. He wanted to order a tasting menu as well, but unfortunately, he has quite severe allergies (to nuts sea creatures) and the restaurant was not at all accommodating despite having various land animals and birds on the menu. The servers did not even ask the chef if accommodations could be made– they simply said no to us immediately. They repeatedly tried to serve him things with nuts (like my birthday cake and some fish bread) which meant I had to play the food taster before he could eat anything. This is not a travesty at such a high quality restaurant, but at the same time, the staff could remember that the ingredients you’ve said someone is allergic to can kill that person– especially at a birthday dinner!
The highlights of the food included a snail pasta, a tempura style fried poached egg, and some incredible seaweed fish bread. All three of those were like nothing I’d ever consumed before, and I still feel baffled by how incredible the dishes served were. The meat mains (we had the lamb and pork) are clearly not their forte as the lamb was unevenly cooked and the pork was overly crispy in certain parts. Gordon Ramsey’s in London still wins for best pork we’ve ever consumed.
The wine, as everyone says, is one of the highlights of the meal– it is perhaps the most expensive wine at a michelin restaurant I have encountered, but it was also one of the most memorable. The sommelier didn’t speak very good English and struggled to communicate with us, so we had to make our own wine decisions. However, we made fairly good choices so we had no hard feelings there in the end.
Comically, they have some bad translations in their English menus– as a Spanish and Portuguese speaker I was able to identify these easily, so they should really have a native Italian and English speaker look over their menu to make some corrections… particularly on their dishes containing nuts.
Overall– the food and wine are definitely worthwhile, but the service and accommodation for allergies should really be improved.

Managed to make reservations here a few days beforehand at a decent time. Was staying at the St Regis though so had a few bloody marys and oysters beforehand. Upon arrival (we were like 20 minutes late but the restaurant was fine with that), decided the tasting menu might have been too much so my partner and I decided to just order from the menu. The wine bible is definitely a sight to behold and I’ve heard a wide range count of just how many bottles they have in the cellar (100,000 to upwards of 150,000). If you love Italian reds like I do, you will be more than satisfied. Just remember to look at the prices of what you’re getting because some of those vintages get pretty ridiculously pricey. We were very surprised by the portions of the dishes (the entrees were also pushing 100 euros so I guess that makes sense) and even though I was not really hungry, I definitely cleaned off my plate. We went with the prawns with eggs from sea and earth, Agnoletti with white beans and veal tendons, and Mora Romagnolia baby pork. All 3 dishes were very well presented and although the restaurant is French influenced, the core Italian flavors still came through. I usually don’t eat pork but the baby pork almost made me question why. Like most Michelin star restaurants, expect gifts from the kitchen to try. People might complain about the place being pricey but come on, you should know what to expect. This place is top notch in terms of service and food and I would love to come back to try their tasting menu next time to determine if I can move them in my rankings from excellent to blown away

We were trying to make last minute reservations, but ended up arriving at Pinchiorri as I ended the conversation. The Mattre’d /​Sommelier: Alessandro Tomberli only gave us the ‘Private Room’ when the rest of the restaurant was empty.
We were a group of 11 but were willing to be split into separated tables.
out of all the tables we saw, there were only 4 parties of ²⁄₄ people.
We refused and he victimized me by saying how he should have received a credit card to insure the reservation. But it was not necessary because we had just arrived on the Fly.
As we were walking out:
Alessandro Tomberli Shouted, «Vaffanculo Stupido!» (F*ck off/​you, idiots!).
Enough Said.
When you read this Alessandro, You will surely hear from Michelin about this very soon. Mark my Words.

Came to Italy for our 10 year Anniversary. Florence, is smaller than Rome but in a good way, for example much better restaurants. Maybe it’s the Tuscany food cuisine. But be aware you will be paying an arm & leg here.
The service was very good & the wine recommendation was excellent. The wine book itself is huge! And price can range from 400 to over a 1,000 euros just for wine. There is a water book as well! We did the tasting menu with some 10 plus dishes, I can’t remember all of them… And not all of them were spectacular, but most were good. And if you tell them you are here for a special occasion they come out with balloons & an extra dessert item with candles and a around of applause from all the staff. Even the owner & chef came out to congratulate us on our anniversary.
This place is special probably the best restaurant in Florence. But remember it’s very pricy so only recommend it if you are celebrating a special occasion or are super rich!!!

The only 3-​Star Michelin in a major Italian City — this was a no brainer.
Reserving:
Chaos — email response was prompt to confirm date/​time, but since I didn’t want to email it, trying to call to tell them a CC number to hold the reservation was insane. Couldn’t reach the reservationist on three tries. The person picking up the phone could not understand what I was trying to tell him even though he spoke English. I almost had to argue with him to convince him to write down my CC number and leave a message for the reservationist. Very stark contrast to other 3-​Star international reservation experiences.
Atmosphere:
Old school, traditional upscale dining room. Fairly minimalist. Soooo quiet that we really felt like the big loud Americans. Ask for a kitchen tour, because those are always fun.
Service:
As the other reviews indicate, there were no less than 7 people who greeted us, I lost count before we got into the main dining room. VERY VERY formal and serious. I felt like I was being watched and followed constantly. I was worried they were going to watch me use the toilet. There were some palpable lags between courses, but overall, the service was incredibly tight and spot on.
Drink:
If I were an Eonophile, then this place would have been heaven. The wine list is INSANE. However, we are lightweights and really can’t hold our liquor, so we just drank really really really expensive water (15 Euro/​bottle for what are 3 – 4 Euro bottles elsewhere). Granted their water list is almost as extensive as the wine list for most other restaurants.
Food:
Whispers of Autumn Tasting Menu — no point going into each course since it will change. Overall, a little molecular, a little traditional. The molecular items were actually much more delicious. The more traditional items were surprisingly average. This is from someone who enjoys molecular but would take traditional mom and pop cooking any day over it. We were a bit taken aback by straight up raw garganelli. The servers were visibly distressed by our uneaten plates and when we explained that they were raw, they looked at each other in shock and told us they were al dente — I wasn’t in the mood to argue, but I know al dente and this was just straight up raw. I can’t remember everything we ate because this was the first place where we weren’t given a menu to take home. The highlights were the amuse and giant bonbon tray — so the meal did start and end strong.
Overall:
3.5 stars for food — not cutting edge nor tasty enough to really hang with other 3 stars (or even some 2 stars), but still a fun menu. The service, as much as it was not my style, deserves 5 stars — the staff really do try their darnedest to impress. Despite the hiccups, we still had a fantastic time and it was worth the 300+ Euro.

The Michelin three star of Firenze. It is beyond reproach.
From beginning to end you are treated as a Medici guest. Greeted by a large staff on arrival, invited to your table, given a wonderful glass of the chardonnay e traminer produced and bottled solely for the restaurant, presented with the Pinchiorri’s best food and wine. offered a tour of the magical wine cellar, finally given gifts of chocolates before returning to the night.
It is everything a Michelin three star restaurant should be; flawless service, incredible food with wines to match, in a charming setting of a two hundred year old grand Tuscan home.
VERY IMPORTANT to avoid disappointment:
1. Understand the experience is going to cost. You are about to enjoy incredible food paired with the world’s best wines. It is a once in a lifetime dining experience.
2. This is a wine centric restaurant. Only the best and only with the right amount of cellaring. Prices reflect this commitment to excellence. € 250 for the least expensive bottle.
3. Expect € 600 per diner for a degustation menu and MINIMAL wine pairing. Budget at least € 1,500 per diner to cover any menu and all but the most extravagant wine pairings.
4. Do not read too many reviews before you go. Many are over embellished and describe «extras» not provided. There is no complimentary glass of 2000 vintage Dom, no BMW limo to take you back to your hotel, they do not pay for your taxi either.
The food captures Tuscany and the season itself; the blooming flowers, the smell of the country side, the colors. It is a stunning expression of bold, bright flavors. It strikes the right balance between the traditional and modernist cuisine using the best of each to extract the most flavor and tease the senses.
The 20 course «Whispers of Spring», € 250, is artistry captured in single bites:
Mozzarella water and cucumber soda. A single shot. The light milky color belies its incredible flavor. It’s so confusing. It shouldn’t be a liquid and pack the flavor explosion of biting into a ball of fresh mozzarella.
Snails in olive oil. Thumbnail sized escargot, roasted in shell and placed on crisp «bread crumbs» and powdered olive oil that becomes a liquid when it hits your tongue.
A sweetened parmesan crisp with a pesto «pouch». The pesto’s surface is gelatinous the interior pure liquid. Bite into it and concentrated flavor of fresh basil and pine nuts coats your mouth enhanced by the crisp. Magical.
The pigeon sandwich served with a crisp pigeon leg. Shocking simplicity. Simply roasted. Pick the leg up by the foot and bite into the crisp skin, it practically melts in your mouth. The moist breast topped with more crispy skin and served between olive oil toast, the slightly metallic flavor of pigeon enveloped in melting fatty goodness.
Then the desert courses. A wild fennel and orange flower sherbet. Massive citrus aromas but not flavor. It’s almost as if it vaporizes on the palate. Mystifying. Colorful sweetened spring carrots scented by geranium. The aroma of the geranium is heady but eat the carrot and all you taste is pure essence of carrot.
Now, the wines. 5000+ selections backed by a 200,000+ bottle cellar. Deep verticals of all the first growth Bordeaux to the 1940’s with some vintages in the 1800’s. Classified growths are represented with the best of the best vintages only (1961, 1982, 1989, 1990, 2000, etc). Extensive collection of grand cru Burgundy including an unbelievable collection of DRC’s. The best of the best of Italy including massive Super Tuscan verticals.
Order by the bottle or opt for a wine card (pairing) from over 200 wine by the glass. Ordering is simple. Wines are grouped by great vintage, ie 2000 or 1990. Select the number of wines you want (3 – 5). Let the sommelier know if you have a specific region you want emphasized. Done. Straight forward pricing in the book (Four wines from the 2000 vintage € 400; three from the 1990 vintage € 500; 5 1990 all Super Tuscan € 1000 etc). All are special but wine lovers should opt for the € 1000 flights.
Outstanding 20+ selection water list.
Advance booking several months in advance required. Credit card to warranty your reservation due at confirmation. Jackets required.
I just ate Tuscany. I just ate spring. I did it in just five magical hours. Beyond reproach.

I celebrated my recent birthday there and it was the most amazing food, most amazing service, and the tasting menu with wine pairing was absolutely perfect. This 3-​star Michelin restaurant will cost you a pretty penny (1000 euro for two people) but for a very special occasion it was absolutely worth it. I will remember this meal for the rest of my life

I recently had the 20 course tasting menu, «Whispers of Summer» for 235 euros. The current menu options and pricing can be seen on their website.
The dishes were all very good, but the portions were so small that I was barely full by the end of the meal. Four of the 20 dishes, for example, were single amuse-​bouches served at the beginning of the meal. Thankfully, several additional «surprise» dishes were served to supplement the courses. The meal finished with a choice from about 15 different chocolates — I chose a truffle, white chocolate coconut curry, and dark chocolate with Darjeeling tea filling, but all sounded good.
Two complimentary glasses of wine were served to supplement the least expensive water at 10 euros (a Tuscan water with a pH of 8.2 at 20 degrees Celsius) — both delicious, as you might expect from an enoteca. The restaurant does serve excellent bottles of wine by the glass that you might otherwise not be able to try, albeit at high prices, and those ordering wine received additional complementary glasses.
Service was excellent, with at least one server watching over a given table and ready to refill water or remove a dish. I arrived at the beginning of service, and there were four servers attending to my table in an empty room. The chef came out after a few courses to check on the dishes with several tables, something that I believe happens every night if you’d like the opportunity to chat.
Overall a lovely meal, but not a good value. Dishes at nearby dining establishments, such as Café Coquinarius (and even the paninis of I Fratellini) were just as good and ¹⁄₁₀ the price.

Preface: 6 course tasting menu is 225 Euro per person or 9 courses for 285 Euro/​pp. For a 3 Michelin Star restaurant, this pricing was expected. Wine pairings: they offer choices of how many wines to choose: to accompany the 6 course tasting menu, choices ranged from 3 – 6 wines. The kicker is the wine prices… 3 glasses for 325 Euro per person, for the CHEAPEST pairing choices. 6 glasses (one for each course) was priced at 625 Euro/​pp, or about 105 Euro PER GLASS.
I knew going in that Enoteca would be expensive, but the wine prices put me in shock. My wife and I decided to pick a bottle instead, since spending 650 Euro (cheapest option for 2 people) on wine was not what we wanted to do, the cheapest bottle was 175 Euro. We chose a bottle which was ~$ 500 to pair better with our meals. Needless to say, the pricing and reviews set our expectations VERY HIGH.
FOOD: The food was pretty good, maybe 8 out of 10, but nothing really special/​unique like I usually expect when I pay over $ 250 for food for one person. The wine suggested by the sommelier was also quite good, but I would hve expected to pay about $ 125 for wine of that quality at a restaurant in Manhattan (where we’re from), so $ 500 still felt pretty extreme.
SERVICE: They tried very hard, as was evident by the fact that they had almost 2 waiters on the floor PER TABLE. However, I did have a few (minor) issues with the service, which I feel inclined to mention given the price they charged:
1) At one point I went 5 minutes with an empty wine glass before they poured more from our bottle.
2) My wife waited 3 minutes with an empty tea cup before starting to pour her own refill.
3) They don’t fold or provide new napkins when a guest goes to the restroom, they just leave the old one in a ball on the chair where the guest put it.
4) Thr waiters, on 2 separate ocassions, attempted to clear my plate before I was finished. I didn’t position my utensils to indicate I was done, they just came over and tried to take my plate that still had (very expensive) food on it!
5) They never checked to see if we liked the meal or were enjoying ourselves.
ATMOSPHERE: One major issue I had, was the the restaurant suggested a jacket be worn, and given the price level, we were expecting a fairly high-​class romantic dinner. However, about ½ the men (clients) in the restaurant wore JEANS, most with several buttons on their shirt undone at the top, and no one seemed to be enjoying the food. Music was good, they had a live pianist and a violin player, but they only played intermittently, seemly one song, whenever asked by the owner. Over the 3.5 hours we were there, we heard about 3 songs, mostly after 11pm.
In summery, it was a good meal, but it fell well short of my expectations, given the price. We ate at a restaurant called «Quadri» in Venice, which was given 1 Michelin Star and only cost half as much (include 6 wine pairings for 2 people), and I thought Quadri was significantly better than Enoteca, across the board (service, food and atmosphere).

You don’t just get fed here, you are treated to an experience that you will never forget.
I came across this restaurant by accident — I was in Florence with a friend and looked in the Zagat guide for a good place for supper. I booked a table for a Saturday night and thought nothing more of it. We turned up and immediately realised that this was a special place. It is set in the most beautiful old building with a fairly grand sweeping staircase. We were greeted by no less than 8 people, all impeccably turned out and very polite. We were shown to our table in the dining room — which only has about 8 tables in total. We were the only people not in a couple celebrating something special, and felt a little under dressed in (very smart) jeans. However, the staff were just magical — behaving as if we had arrived in ball gowns and were worthy of the royal treatment.
We soon realised that this was to be a ‘special’ evening, not just a meal, but a gastronomic experience. We decided to go for the tasting menu, as «when in Rome…» (or Florence actually!)
The meal/​experience/​extravaganza was utterly amazing. It was like a show — from the bread that came with a choice (and explanation) of around 5 different olive oils (from nutty to light) and 5 different salts (including black volcanic!) to the petit fours and coffee, it was stunning. In the middle we tried around 8 different courses, including bacon and egg ravioli, seafood soup, the tenderest beef that I have ever tasted and the most amazing dessert. It was a complete surprise, and we were presented with beautiful plates of «Berries o’clock» in the shape of a clock. Unfortunately I am allergic to berries, but that was no problem — it was whipped away and an extravagant «chocolate forest» was presented instead. It had a fallen tree, mushrooms, a little stream and grass — all made out of various chocolates! It was a shame to eat it! (But eat it I did and my, it was delicious!)
We were utterly stuffed, but still managed a glass of the most perfect desert wine I have ever tasted!
I am not sure that my wallet will support going back here (it was 450 euro a head), but I am so glad that I have experienced it!

This Unilocal review is long over due. This was me and my boyfriend’s first time in Italy back in April 2011 and we thought it would be a great opportunity to dine at a 3 michelin star restaurant in a country we’ve never been to. From the moment we walked in and out of the restaurant, we had the utmost service. We had both had the 8 course meal with 3 bottles of wine (they opened each bottle and poured us only one glass each and took it away) Each course was delicious and the wine pairing made it a little more delightful. After we had our dinner, they came out with a dessert tray that consisted of petite fours which we thought were good. After dessert, we ordered blue mountain Jamaican coffee that amazed both of our taste buds. The best coffee ever, Why the 4 stars instead of 5? The 3 bottles of wine pairing were way over-​priced (900 euros) If we would do it all over again, we would have just ordered a glass of wine or two with our meal since they only poured us one glass from the bottle anyway. Overall, it was a great experience and would recommend trying it out if you’re a big foodie.

This is the only Michelin 3-​star restaurant my wife and I have ever been to. We came to this restaurant as part of our 3 night tour of Florence during our honeymoon back in Oct 2010. The food and service here were excellent.
Upon our arrival at the restaurant we were brought to a waiting room for a few minutes. There was an assortment of cigars on display. Not sure if the cigars were complementary or not. In any case I didn’t smoke any cigars.
The restaurant has a strict dress code. I did not have a coat or blazer. Because I did not have one, the restaurant provided one for me to wear during dinner. This has never happened to me before.
We both had the tasting menu. I especially liked the cheese selection. We had limonciello as part of the dessert.
After we finished our dinner we needed a taxi to get back to our hotel. I told the maitre’d; the maitre’d called in a BMW to take us back. When we tried to pay for the taxi the driver said that we did not need to pay (or at least that we can pay however much we want). I suspect that the restaurant paid for the taxi. We ended up tipping the driver anyways. This has never happened to us before.