Gusto Leo

This place was alright. I ordered a salad which was definitely the wrong call. It was basically lettuce with a few basil leaves on it. My friends got risotto and gnocchi and were much happier. The ambience is OK, but it’s not the most comfortable place. It feels more on the low end and I think there are better places to go in the area. The food was fine, but not a place I’m dying to go back to.

My wife and I came here on the recommendation of the Rick Steves Guide Book, but I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone else. The food was just average, the service wasn’t great.
I had the grilled vegetable pizza and it was fine, just nothing memorable. Given my wife’s dietary restrictions, she had an iceberg lettuce salad. It also took forever for the waiter to take our order and for us to get our food.
Overall, not impressed. Don’t bother going here.

At least 20 types of pasta made fresh in house. My husband got tagliatelle with bolognese sauce and I got tortellini stuffed with spinach and cheese in wine and cheese sauce. We’d had a late lunch so that’s all we had but it was wonderful! Casual trattoria with both local and tourist diners. Nice house wines. If we were here longer we’d definitely return.

A great place for a quick pasta or pizza lunch after viewing the sculptures at the Bargello museum; food was hearty, service was prompt, price was right. I get the feeling they do a brisk student business here, especially with a takeout counter, and if I were back studying in Florence, I know I’d be a regular.

Great food and great service. Pasta tastes homemade.
We were feeling a little piggish, so we ordered three dishes. All were very good. The 4 cheese calzone was excellent. It had wood burning oven taste. The eggplant parm was diff than american style, but very good and interestingly diff.
Overall, great experience. Plus reasonable prices and no service or cover charge makes this a great value.

A tasty, cozy find on a rainy Florence evening, Gusto Leo provided a good selection of new flavors and old favorites. Like many ristorantes in Firenze, the menu offered loose English translations and ao was friendly for us Americans. Service was amiable and ambiance was delightful.
Hearty, generous zuppas (soups) started us off with a chunky tomato and a bread/​vegetable mix in cute crocks. The unpretentious staff accommodated our picky 9-​year-​old with a basic Penne Pomodoro (penne with tomato sauce) and a latte freddo (cold milk!).
The salads were large and fresh, a classic Caprese as well as a mixed salad with gorgonzola and their delicious oil and balsamic dressing.
The dessert was a Panna Cotta alla Nutella, and came with complimentary limoncello shots. A powerful way to end a flavorful, satisfying and relaxing Italian meal in a warm atmosphere. Recommend Gusto Leo with mucho gusto.

Gusto Leo was the first restaurant I tried when I was in Florence. We decided to go with the rule that if the place is busy and full of locals, than it is probably pretty good. That turned out to be a useful trick. I especially enjoyed the bustling atmosphere of the restaurant, the service, and the lasagna.
The restaurant kind of sprawls on either side of a large bar area, which houses a pizza oven and a glass display full of gelato. There were a lot of families in the restaurant, and people were ordering round after round of dishes. The windows were floor to ceiling and open to the street, and the lighting was bright, yellow and cheerful. The place gave off a busy household-​during-​the-​holidays vibe.
Of course there was a very large traditional menu, with pastas, antipastas, starters, meat dishes, and pizza. I ordered pene with salmon in a cream vodka sauce, and altogether we ordered lasagna and four cheese gnocchi along with bread and wine for the table. That is one thing I really like about Italy. I like getting bread on the table before the meal. This is common in the States to get bead rolls or breadsticks or some such thing to nibble while you are waiting for your food, but this is not the case in Poland, and I miss it. I especially like the Italian way of eating it with oil, salt, perhaps some balsamic vinegar, whatever you want. The best part is that it’s followed by the first dinner and the second dinner and you sit there for hours and graze. It’s wonderful.
I really really enjoyed the lasagna here. It was the best dish by far. The vodka/​salmon combo was good too, but nothing special. I guess I prefer richer sauces with a deeper flavor. I wasn’t impressed with the gnocchi at all, but I never am. I simply do not like it in general, and I don’t like anything of that consistancy, especially Polish kopytka. Honestly, in Italy you can order any number of plain pastas and be completely satisfied with them. This place had several standard pasta dishes that made me happy and a nice environment.
The service was also very good. The place was crowded and we had to wait awhile to get a table, but they were diligent about seating us. Once we were seated, the waitress was attentive and (becuase it was a tiny table for two) was very creative about finding a place for everything to fit on the table. Even though there were much bigger groups with kids and lots of dishes moving back and forth between the kitchen and their table, we weren’t neglected and we were treated very well.
I reccommend if you happen to be in Florence and you’re are looking for a regular place with Italian staples at normal prices.

I visited florence for a few days. Whenever I needed a quick bite and was rushed or didn’t know where else to go I went here. The food was always delicious and the staff was always great. For the price it’s pretty excellent.

Great food and service. Plenty of options for our vegan family and they happy made adjustments to some of the pizzas to accommodate us. Pizzas were very good. Big menu and good location.

Reasonably priced food and overall great atmosphere. Staff was friendly and they even gave us complimentary lemonchello after our meal. We ordered pasta with boar sauce and it was delicious. We were then unsure what meat platter to order so we chose one at random. It basically was a fired veal cutlet with some French fries. Not happy with that selection because we were looking for a more authentic Italian meal. Will come back to this place!

We stopped in here, basically because the sign said «free wifi» and we wanted to check in for our flight. We ordered a gelato and cappuccino. The service was a bit snooty, but it’s a busy place.
When I asked about the password, the server dropped a laminated slip of paper at the table. Seriously, it’s the longest and lamest password I have ever seen. Plus there are several hot spots in the area, so you’re not even sure you’re logging into the right one. Try typing this with your mobile device! (see photo)

Gusto Leo is a great place to grab some Italian food. Good atmosphere, friendly staff, and fantastic food! Highly recommend the lasagne and Alfredo.

Les pizze sont bonnes et assez peu chers. Dans l’ensemble un bon endroit pour une restauration rapide et abordable.

My last minute dinner or lunch fix! Right around the corner of my house as a student.
Decent Italian food, the 4 cheese gnocchi was something I ate often.
Always good for a quick bite!

As an American studying abroad in Firenze, this was one of the only places I went to regularly. As a vegetarian, they had a good selection of pastas without meat. However, it wasn’t particularly memorable. The food itself was the reason I kept returning, not the atmosphere or the people.

Good prices. My wife, son, and I loved their Margherita pizza. Their salads were very fresh with good produce.

This place has decent food and pretty comfortable atmosphere. I had the chicken cacciatore which was too salty. Our server was nice, she brought a complimentary taste of prosecco upon arrival and lemoncello after dinner. I had a margarita pizza which was good

This place does things a little differently, and that’s not exactly a good thing. In fact, Gusto Leo has been my worst dining experience in the week I have been in Italy. Finding it thrilling to finally find a dish that included chicken, the Caesar salad by itself was fine, but the dressing tasted no different from mayo. The pizza was fine, but the sangria was the worst I have ever had… and I have enjoyed many a sangria. It was super heavy on the… drumroll…heavy on the cinnamon. I sent it back, telling the waitress the cinnamon was way too much. The second try was the exact same and, finally, the third try was sans cinnamon. Still disgusting. It was apparently a cheap, supersweet wine they were using, and you could see the sugar resting at the bottom of the glass. No thanks.
The waitress wasn’t much of a help, either. She was getting impatient and rude because we didn’t like this standard drink that they don’t prepare in a standard way. At least they didn’t charge for the awful drink. I would have paid for it, though, because at that point I just wanted to get the heck out of there.
Gusto Leo is a convenient place to drop in, as it’s on one of the busier streets in Florence, but I really don’t recommend it.