Brunch Bar U' Ciddar — Restaurant in Matera

We were vacationing in Matera in late September. I am from the United States but my parents are from Italy with many relatives still living in Italy. I asked our Italian host of our B&B to recommend an authentic Italian place to eat. We didn't want a fancy restaurant, but a home cooked meal that is truly Italian. Since the host is a local, he recommended Brunch Bar U'Ciddar. We are so happy he did! Don't think of this place as a restaurant, but more of a place to each where Giovanna (Genny) prepares a selection for that day and dishes for you to choose from, each with love and affection. Immediately when you walk you, you are greeted by her, with a warm welcome and even some of the customers eating will say hello too. You feel like you walked into a family place. We we so hungry that when we walked to the counter, Genny showed us the buffet that was available, and we said we wanted a little bit of each. And we are so glad we did! The cavatelli was delicious, the eggplant parmigiana was to die for, the stuffed peppers and eggplant I could have ate forever, the lasagne - magnifico! All the food was great! We enjoyed a bottle home wine, and ended our meal a selection of desserts, each one as good that the next. To top it off, Genny shared some homemade digestivo which ended the meal perfectly. The staff and even the other customers joined in conversation. By the end of the night we were laughing and singing (my husband is a professional jazz singer). Genny is a warm and wonderfully friendly woman who you can tell is very proud of her cooking and her business. If you are in Matera, forget the foo foo, chi chi sophisticated restaurants that are all over Matera. Go to U' Ciddar for the authentic homemade Italian food and the true experience of eating Iike an Italian - in a place where you feel...

If you want to feel like you're eating in someone's family home in Italy, a cheerful family making and serving great food, you want to come here. We had an experience like this twenty five years ago in Palermo, and it is such a relief from standard restaurant dining.

The food feels steeped in tradition, it's hearty and full of strong flavors. There are many vegetarian options, my partner (who is a vegetarian) had an eggplant pasta dish, I had zucchini. While the latter doesn't sound very interesting, it was.

There's a menu but it is irrelevant, Giovanna shows you what you can have and you pick it out, right there at the front of the kitchen. Giovanna and Carlo bring it to the table, make sure you like it, pour the wine you ordered, and then you get in with it. The dessert was excellent also, we had the chocolate and pistachio cake and fresh strawberries.

So while there are some nice "fancy" restaurants here, this is the one place you have to eat when you...

We had dinner in this lovely bar-restau while in stunning Matera. We navigated our way through pouring rain using google maps. It was quite challenging. Thank God we didn't give up! ù Ciddar boasts offering local cooked homemade food and this is exactly what you get. English is neither on the menu, nor it is spoken here. However, there's a bella Italian mama called Jovana, who presents you with a variety of scrumptous dishes lain in a display cabinet. We tried the 3 items for 16 Euros, so we got to taste 6 different dishes. All were very good! Jovana and her dedicated staff kept checking on the clients to make sure they enjoyed their food. For dessert we had a slice of the ricoota almond cheese cake and 2 coffees. In short: excellent value for money, excellent food, excellent atmosphere. A well...