Trattoria San Giuseppe cenobio — Restaurant in Nardò

We stopped here while wandering the old streets, with 4 adults and 4 kids, the location is truly charming, a beautiful spot to sit outside and enjoy the atmosphere.

Unfortunately, the food didn’t live up to expectations. We are big fans of Italian cuisine and usually seek out local pasta dishes, but the 3 pastas we tried were quite disappointing. We ordered Laiana Torta Affumicata, Ciciri e Tria, and Gnocchi di Patate. All felt overcooked (not al dente) and lacking in the balance of flavor we associate with traditional Italian cooking. The other couple in our group tried seafood pasta and agreed it was below average, though they managed to finish theirs. In our case, we left most of the pasta on the table, which almost never happens for us in Italy.

We understand that Ciciri e Tria is a rustic, traditional Salento recipe (with fried pasta pieces and chickpeas), so perhaps it was more about our expectations. But even allowing for that, the execution felt flat compared to many other trattorie we’ve enjoyed across Puglia.

In short: lovely setting, but the food was underwhelming, especially the pasta, which should shine in...

The place looked bright and welcoming. It was absolutely packed on a Sunday night so we thought we'd wait for them to clear a table and give it as try.

I had tagliatelle and lamb chops. The tagliatelle was OK. A bit overdone and nondiscript. The lamb chops came with some sort of coating that reminded me of bad southern fried chicken. They tasted terrible and appeared to be bad as I was up all night sick afterwards.

My wife had lamb roll. Neither of us knew it was actually offal (probably our fault, but the term is used differently at home) I actually like offal, but this was terrible.

I asked for a glass of red wine and was brought a large glass of fortified sweet wine! There was defintely something wrong that evening.

All round, the worst meal I've ever had anywhere...

You might be tempted by the promise of authenticity and bio/organic quality but the only thing this place has to offer is a nice location. Food is average at best, verging on uninspiring with touches of suspiciously stale. Service is discourteous and definitely not kid friendly - probably underpaid staff mistreated by the same snobby business people who sensed the opportunity to wow tourists with the aura of “peasant cooking in glamorous setting”, while serving room temperature whites in 38 degree weather. Do yourself a favour and...