High-intensity travel makes me hungry — especially in Italy. The one meal I’ve been looking forward to more than any other is a big steak dinner at Osteria dell’ Aquacheta in Montepulciano. Warning: Vegetarians may want to skip this post.
They jam the place for four seatings (two for lunch and two for dinner) every day. It’s a long room with communal tables under a medieval barrel vault. In the back, like the engine of a steam train, a fire roars behind a huge hunk of cow lying flat as if on a gurney.
You don’t have much of a choice here. Giulio, who reminds me of George Carlin with a cleaver, parades through the room with slabs of beef for diners to consider. It costs about €3 per hundred grams (about $3 per quarter pound) and they serve 1.6 kilos of beef for each couple (about $50 for two). You don’t say how you want it cooked. There’s a correct way: seven minutes on each side. Fifteen minutes after you say OK, it’s chow time.
Every few seconds the happy sound of “George Carlin” slamming his cleaver through the beef rockets through the room — stoking every appetite under that old, brick-domed ceiling.
Osteria dell’ Aquacheta brings out the carnivore in all its guests.
Vegetarians won’t enjoy this restaurant. But she sure did.
Reminds me of Il Latini in Florence!
Yes this place is good………….if you like meat and lots of it. I was there 2 years ago.
Speaking as a vegetarian: I ate there twice in 2011 and loved it! My sister and I had an apartment in Montepulciano and used M. as a base for discovering Tuscany. We had two very memorable meals of salads and great veggie pasta dishes at Osteria dell’ Aquacheta. The show, though, is certainly those huge steaks and watching people try to finish them!
I am a vegetarian and would LOVE to eat there! Italians are so gracious and go way out of their way to serve the best vegetarian meals to those who request them. It is how I discovered and became a fan of pecorino cheese!
Hi,
The steak looks incredible.
Thanks for letting us know about it.
Buon appitito,
Jeff
The First Ricknick
We have been seeing these super steaks in Florence, I don’t remember this the last time we were here. Four of us could eat one!