Chef Box - Le Bistrot

An experience that deserves more than 5 stars. This bistro has tremendous potential.

Unique and carefully crafted dishes: from the presentation of each dish to the choice of each ingredient. Even the selection of drinks is limited but good.

I'm sure there will be many more.
A new gem in my neighborhood.

Congratulations and good luck!

I was so looking forward to eating at Chef Box! A gourmet restaurant in Quadraro with affordable prices… ! However gourmet is yet not and consequently the bill seems steep.
But honestly, I don’t mind paying the price when the food is good, when you find quality in the production and when you feel the luxury of being pampered.
And I really wanted to fall in love with Chef Box, but was disappointed from the start, from the bread (6eur) that had the consistency of a beginner’s recipe for homemade bread (sorry, during Covid, we all learned to make this bread!) and Burnt Aubergine Butter (you said what? It certainly didn’t taste auberginey or nutty at all, just the taste of supermarket-quality butter). The chef should have spared the Chinese-style ravioli he offered as amuse bouche: the mix of flavours did not harmonise in the mouth. Oops that was suppose to be the welcoming treat, what restaurants give to introduce the quality of their food! (And in many cases, the best dish in the house!). The two pasta dishes we ordered were small and tasteless: Cacio pepe (16 eur) and chestnut gnocchi with a swiss chard pesto (18 eur) My cacio pepe was not well emulsified and the pesto in the gnocchi had a strong taste of fridge). As a main, we ordered Turbot with Jerusalem artichokes; the fish was cooked with the slime of the artichokes giving it a gelatine consistency. Again, small portion, no grace, no soul.
We skipped dessert.
As I said, I wanted to love this place so much, and just want to believe that we went there on a bad day, but unfortunately, 93 euro (with wine) for two might seem beyond reasonable in any restaurant in Rome, but here seemed overpriced for what we got.
Snif, snif.

Fantastic food with innovative and seasonal flavours. One of the best meals I've had in the three years I've lived in Rome - a very welcome surprise to find this new refined corner in the Tuscolano area. Forgot to take photos of everything but even the bread/butter had me wanting to come back!