Daria — Restaurant in Unione dei Comuni Valdichiana Senese

This restaurant is a must visit when passing through or staying a few days when making the pilgrimage to Montalcino. We were recommended to the restaurant by our AirBnB hostess; Manuela at La Sorbelle. The town that Daria is in is a real charmer, definitely go earlier to have an Aperol Spritz pre-dinner while catching the sunset or just people watching.

We were greeted on arrival by Daria herself who owns the place. She was a super charming and elegant lady who made us feel right at home. She explained the menu which was great as we are Malaysians who live in Singapore and gladly welcomed the help. Food was exquisite and extremely reasonably priced. I do admire generally the socialist (pricing) aspect to food (and wine) in Tuscany.

We eventually found out that the main chef is actually Sri Lankan who had been in Italy for 20+ years and was determined to expand his culinary knowledge. Establishing that everyone around the world loved Italian food, he had chosen to emigrate to Italy! What a story. Due credit for his efforts and the open minded-ness of Daria as we know that Italians are a proud lot when they come to their cuisine. I loved the food, very traditional and perfectly executed.

The next highlight of our dinner experience was the very special interaction with the sommelier. He was extremely knowledgeable about the region and it was such an education just speaking to him. Daria had procured an excellent selection of the best Montalcino had to offer for what we thought were very reasonable prices. Socialist Brunello! Bloody love it. The sommelier (forgive me, I forgot his name) spent a great amount of time recommending us many other great wine makers in the area to try and to visit. As we had only 4 days in the area, we made it a point to try to visit some of the winemakers he had recommended and for those we could not, we bought bottles home or had them at meals.

If you're gonna have a meal at this place and drink some wine, good for you. The ambience is lovely, food is super high quality and a fantastic wine selection. All traits of a good restaurant right? But honestly, the cherry on the cake for us was the interaction with the owner, waitress, chef and sommelier that made this such a wonderful experience.

We...

Do yourself the favor and seriously consider not dining here. After researching the current Michelin guide, and all of the glowing reviews from years past we couldn’t say no to stopping by Daria.

What we got was completely middling food for extreme prices, and a feeling of complete disappointment. I am not exaggerating when I say that until Daria every single meal we’ve had in Tuscany has been, at the very least, satisfying and worth it.

After ordering we overheard another diner mention how their steak was undercooked & nearly raw. Having just ordered the steak I feared what was coming. Check out the picture attached to this review & consider a) is this an edible level of cook for a “seared steak” and b) when specifically asked preparation & told a medium, is this medium? Maybe it was the wine but I swore the steak said “moo” when it came to the table. Absolutely disgusting & disappointing.

When brought up with the wait staff they still charged us for it & in exchange gave us a $12 bottle of wine on the way out. How insulting to claim this is an exceptional bottle that hopefully makes up for the awful meal. Avoid this place and save yourself the...

My main considerations when choosing a restaurant is the quality of the food, the service, the ambience and the location. Daria's is 5 stars in all catagories. And to top it off Daria knows wine and carried bottles that aren't available in many places. Yesterday our meal began with a delicious sparkling Franciacorta. I ordered the pork, which was cooked in a pastry. The pork was so soft that I could cut it with a fork. My husband's fish was flaky, moist and perfectly seasoned. The pork came with a layered potato souffle and plated with a variety of delicious sauces. The fish was on a bed of pureed vegetables and plated with other artistically placed vegetables. We paired the meal with a bottle of Vernaccia di San Gimignano. It came from an small vintner and was perfect with our meal. Daria is a perfect host and her staff makes you feel completely at home in their beautiful restaurant. If you are anywhere in southern Tuscany you need to go to the small hilltop village of Monticciello and eat at...