Nonno Melo — Restaurant in Rome

The Melo is always a wonderful place to go a very special treat! The food in the atmosphere are wonderful and the staff and owners are very friendly. Make sure you try both the seafood and a pasta dish if you have time to have more than one meal. Everything is wonderful and the cannolis are fantastic, after all, the owner is Sicilian! From the outside it doesn't look like much. You might walk right by it. It's on steps heading up or down from Trajan's column, on the right hand side if you're on the way down. It's almost hard to see and you can't imagine there's a restaurant in there but there is! We journey to Rome at least once a year and every time we are in Rome we go to the Melo at least once if not twice. If you've spent a day at the Coliseum and then go through the Forum, you can go out by trajan's column and the restaurant will be right there, the stairs are to your right as you exit from The Forum Park, and then the restaurant would be on your left going up the stairs. Just don't go out the entrance by the Arch of Titus which is where most people go out because then you're about a 30-minute walk away. And bear in mind that the passage between the Forum proper and the area of trajan's Market where the column is closes before the Park closes. The Melo has both lunch hours and dinner hours. The dinner hours begin about...

100% Tourist Trap, STAY AWAY!

All positive reviews are written by inexperienced (less traveled) tourists

ORDER: Grilled steak €15, Lasagna €11, French Fries €5, small Peroni beer €4, Brochette €5

FOOD QUALITY: Steak was inedible, very chewy with grizzle and had no flavor (also looks like it has been broiled not grilled) (€15)

Lasagna was very poorly made. Just noodles and sauce with little cheese on top. No ricotta filling, and the sauce was very sour and did not have a tomato or meat flavor at all! (€11)

French fries had 5-7 pieces of fries without any sauce! (€5)

Brochette is a single piece of bread with canned tomatoes. Tasted very sour with no flavor. (€5)

SERVICE: Very rude, cocky with bad hygiene waiter, who was very pushy on selling fries and wine. Also they inaccurately calculated and lied on our receipt trying to scam a few extra euros.

ATMOSPHERE: Very small place was 70% full of English speaking and Asian tourists on a Tuesday 7pm. We did not see or hear a single Italian. I doubt a single Italian would step a foot inside these doors.

REASON: Place is popular on Google as its top on the list for restaurants in downtown Rome. Maybe it was good at one point now they simply do not care since they have strong Internet presence with constant flow...

We have been to a lot of nice restaurants during the 2-week Italy trip but this is the only one I still think of after being back to Singapore.

The last day in Rome, we had both lunch and dinner here.

Pasta Amatriciana probably is the favorite I ever had so far. It’s very homy comfy taste that can eat everyday yet still have multiple layers of flavors. Nicely balanced tomato base with a hint of bacon and chili. Just perfect with their choice of pasta. (Looks like they only use 1 type of pasta and we tried other pastas for dinner and felt the amatriciana was the best.)

The grilled seafood was well done too. Especially the sword fish (or it’s the sword fish roll) so good that we ordered a 2nd plate. Even the side dish broccoli is just nice!

As soon as you enter the place and sit down for a while, you can tell it has years of history from the photos on the wall. The senior couple owner operated since their hair still black. They’re friendly and funny even we weren’t able to communicate a lot. We had relaxing and comfortable time here and would love to come back when...