Ristorante Ad Hoc — Restaurant in Rome

I usually don’t leave reviews, but given how I largely decided to eat here based on the reviews, I hope my review can save another couple from having a bad meal in such a great food city….. please save your money and eat elsewhere. ——————— My wife and I ate here because it had decent reviews and every other restaurant we tried was booked but Ad Hoc had availability (not a good sign in Rome). Although they had a nice staff/nice interior setting, the food was both the most expensive we had in Italy ($233 for a tasting menu for two) and the worst we had in Italy. Based on the high-priced/low-quality food, and the fact that every patron around us appeared to be tourists, I think this is a tourist trap that uses its fancy appearance and premium prices to trick visitors into thinking that it’s a good restaurant.

While basically all the food was nicely plated, giving the impression of a high-end meal, it all tasted old, bland or potentially reheated. Two examples stand out as particularly bad: 1) On our second course we were given a shredded beef dish in the shape of a puck. My wife almost threw up because it tasted/smelled like reheated cat food. Neither of us could finish it and when the waitress picked up our plates, she looked slightly embarrassed and unsurprised that we didn’t finish it. 2) On my final course I was given 3 desserts, one of which was a cannoli. This thing clearly had been previously frozen/thawed out because it was both flavorless and completely soggy/water-logged. My wife stills randomly laughs weeks later at my reaction when I took a bite of it.

Please don’t waste your money or a meal on this place when there’s so many wonderful restaurants in this city! If you plan ahead, you can eat at a Michelin-star restaurant for...

This place has a wonderful atmosphere, amazing staff, cheerful, helpful and professional service and tasty food. It was a real dilemma to rate, as the efforts are 100% there. But I think it’s really important for the degustation menu to be satisfying but not overfilling.

We had two kinds of degustation menu: ‘land’ and ‘Roman’ with wine pairing. Before even starting the menu we were given complimentary sparkling wine, a small savoury gâteau, breadsticks and olive oil. We were quite hungry and found this a nice gesture. This was followed by a starter that was 3 different and quite hearty starters on one plate. It was followed by pasta variations, 2 mains combined on a plate, pre-dessert and dessert. We love to eat and had degustation menus in several places before, but this was the first time we could not finish - we got so full long before dessert, actually after the starters we could have just finished eating. It was too much food and too much variation. We asked for the dessert to go, and had no capacity to have the dessert wine.

The service was super pro and very fast. It was just a real pity that we couldn’t enjoy the food and the wine pairing to the fullest as we got full so fast. We would have been happier with half the amount of food maybe for a tad bit lower price.

We did not have to pay for the wine we didn’t have, and we even got a surprise present at the end to take away.

If you choose this place be aware that you have to be VERY hungry and thirsty if you want to take the...

We went to this place on a thursday, so things weren't too crowded. Was able to make a reservation online, which I always appreciate when abroad and not speaking the language. Although all further communication on mail and WhatsApp went smoothly. Since we both love to try as much as possible, we chose the tasting menu (sea) with wines included. What happened next was a perfect dining experience... For starters, there's complementary drinks and food on the table even before you order. Staff is really friendly, professional and speaks good english. The food and wines were delicious. Each dish and wine nicely explained and paired perfectly. Officially there were four dishes, but somewhere around 'pre' - dessert and 'post'-dessert I lost count :-) We dined for around three hours and enjoyed every minute of it. We didn't get a meal, we got a true experience full of taste and hospitality. Afterwards I even got a cookbook with some of the recipies and wines explained (although if they read this, I'd still love to get the recipe for the octopus spaghetti...).

If I have to make one remark (true perfection doesn't exist) : why not pair a red wine with the sea menu, it would have worked very well with some dishes.

Anyway, just try this one,...