Our final stop while honeymooning in Italy was in Florence, better known as Firenze! We had started our honeymoon in Naples, and then explored the Amalfi Coast, so it only felt right that we ended in one of the most classic Italian cities we could think of.
Florence is one of the most popular destinations in Italy, next to Rome and the Amalfi Coast, for many reasons. It is one of the most walkable cities in Europe so it’s incredibly easy to navigate around the city without paying for taxis or using public transportation. Being that the city is the heart of the Renaissance period, the city is painted, sculpted and curated with astounding history, art and architecture. The most popular historical attractions being the Duomo di Firenze, Uffizi Art Gallery and Michelangelo's sculpture of David at the Galleria dell’Accademia.
We chose Florence as our last city because we were excited to explore their incredible vineyards nearby in the region of Tuscany, taste the local delicacies including rabbit and wild boar, and experience the fashion! Sure it's not as notorious as Milan, but Florence is way more affordable and approachable with tons of specially curated vintage stores that you’re bound to find some amazing second hand treasures with timeless character.
Hotel we recommend
For our honeymoon were looking for something nice with easy access to the busy parts of Florence. We stayed at Sopr'Arno Suites which looked to be a remodeled apartment building set up to be a beautiful and spacious hotel. The location was fantastic, you're right in the heart of Florence and a few minute walk from the Arno and not even 10 minutes away from Ponte Vecchio.
Seating area set up in our room with the super comfortable green and blue chairs (left), The gorgeous and grand design on the ceiling of our room (center), and little reading nook in the common area outside of our room (right)
My personal favorite part about the hotel was how it was decorated and designed. In the lobby and in our room there are so many books, figures, paintings, and posters. No matter where you looked that was something interesting greeting you. I also have to talk about how our room was furnished! It felt so spacious and inviting with the gorgeous ceiling design and super comfortable chairs. I also got to experience a cast iron bath for the first time and needless to say it was incredible!
Another highlight was the wonderful complementary breakfast offered! I would get so excited to wake up and get to indulge myself with delicious coffee, juices, yogurts, meats, cheeses, and pastries! It was the ultimate Italian breakfast buffet!
The amazing barista whipping up my breakfast cappuccino with the assortment of juices (left); Jars with toppings like oats, apricots and plums for the yogurts (right)
Food Recommendations
The restaurants in Florence exceeded our expectations. We found our favorite places pretty quickly and stuck to them to experience more of their specialties!
In this section, we're sharing our favorite spots to find:
Classic Firenze dishes
A trendy lunch spot with amazing food
A bougie restaurant for your last night
Where we indulged in the Firenze classics
If you're looking for a sit down restaurant while still appreciating the ambiance of Florence, we recommend Ristorante Braceria Auditore. It's found right by the Uffizi and the Piazza della Signoria, so it's a great place to indulge in the classic yet extremely delicious Tuscan cuisine while still being super close to the liveliness of the city.
This restaurant was so good, we ended up going twice! Here are two of the standout dishes we ordered:
1) One of, if not the most, iconic Florence meal is the ‘Bistecca alla Fiorentina’ aka the Florentine Steak. It’s a MASSIVE steak between 2 - 8 pounds, and seasoned with salt, pepper, and a touch of lemon. Your server will approach your table with the uncooked meat to make sure we approve of it, we thought this was a very nice custom. It's commonly cooked one way so no need to say ‘medium’ ‘rare’ or god forbid ‘well done’. I highly recommend getting this to share with someone because it's A LOT of food.
Trying the famous Florentine Steak took us on a trip to heaven and back!
2) If you’re craving some hearty, rich pasta then you need to try the ‘Pappardelle al Cinghiale’. Simply imagine the best spaghetti with meat sauce you've ever had! Pappardelle is a very flat and wide pasta, very similar to fettuccine, and the cinghiale means wild boar. Wild boar are native to roaming the Tuscan region! The wild boar makes it very hearty and rich, especially being paired with broad luxurious pasta noodles to soak up and catch all that amazing sauce! Be sure to ask for extra bread to wipe up your leftover sauce to let none of that deliciousness go to waste. The bread in Florence is commonly unsalted so it's a perfect combo.
Our favorite lunch spot
For a fun, cute, and trendy lunch spot, check out Babae. This gem is a brief 6 minute walk northwest from Ponte Vecchio on the south side of the Arno River.
We discovered Babae from our Buchette del Vino tour, with it being our first stop. We had to come back the next day for lunch because it's all we were thinking about for the rest of the evening afterwards! This is the kind of place where, if I lived in Florence, you’d find me reading a book, working on my laptop, or having a casual hangout with friends.
Besides it being just a great place to eat, relax, and hang out, Babae has a working buchette del vino, aka a ‘wine window’, to order from! Fair warning, it's one of the more popular working wine windows in the area so expect the order line to be AT LEAST 10 minutes long, 5 minutes if you’re lucky and it's a slow period. Besides that, the food and service at the restaurant is wonderful.
If you get the chance to eat here, this is THE dish to get: Tonno del Chianti aka ‘Chianti tuna’.
So I need to preface this and let you know this is NOT a tuna dish, it is pork. The reason it's called the ‘tuna of Chianti’ is because pork is very popular, probably the most popular meat in the Chianti region, and it's very slow cooked giving the meat a very light and succulent texture. The people who first tried the dish compared it to the texture of tuna, and the rest is history. The Tonno del Chianti at Babae is served with pickled onions, mixed salad, and homemade mayonnaise. The richness of the pork combined with the creaminess of the mayo and the sharp acidity of the pickled onions are beyond phenomenal!
This is such a unique dish to try, especially because it switches it up from all of the pasta!
For more of an upscale meal
For our bougie and high end recommendation, we suggest checking out Ristorante La Giostra. It is a very popular spot so we HIGHLY RECOMMEND you get a reservation a month in advance.
This was our romantic honeymoon dinner splurge and we were not disappointed at all. They have a beautiful ambiance, incredible wine, friendly and prompt service, with incredible food to tie it all together. Their slogan on their menu is ‘in food we trust’, and from their plating to ingredients, that saying really shines through. This is a place that takes the ‘art’ of food very seriously. We loved every bit of it!
Here is what we ordered:
- Delicious Appetizer
- Florentine Steak
- Pear Ravioli
Experience Recommendation
1) Buchette del Vino tour
I have always wanted to try one of the historic Buchette (wine windows) in Florence and thankfully my wonderful husband booked the most amazing group tour for us to experience. The tour was over 3 hours and we were introduced to some of the most amazing food and wine throughout our entire trip in Italy.
Our tour began at Piazzo Santo Spirito where we met our wonderful guide Adrienne. Here we got a little history lesson on the surrounding area as well as an explanation of the buchettes we were going to drink from.
Our First Stop was at Babae which absolutely blew us away. Adrienne showed us the buchetta outside of the restaurant but the line was INSANE so we passed that up for some delicious wine and food inside. We ended up sitting right by where the employee serves wine out of the buchetta so we got a great behind the scenes experience.
Our crazy delicious bruchetta for lunch (left), the buchetta station inside Babae (center), and the buchetta on the outside of Babae (right)
After our brief lunch we headed over to Osteria Bella Donne where I got to experience getting wine from a Buchetta! I prefer white wines so I picked the Pinot Grigio on the menu and couldn't be happier with my choice! It was so crisp and flavorful with little notes of apple the only bad part is that I only had one glass.
2) Vintage Store Shopping
One thing is for sure is that the Italians are known for their sense of style and fashion and how foolish would I be to not indulge and splurge on some amazing fashion before I go back home to the US. Besides sightseeing and eating a good chunk of our time in Florence was spent hunting down and getting lost in the sea of amazing vintage stores. Here is a list of some of our favorites locations and finds:
- C'est Chic
Had to get myself a cute black Italian dress to use for the rest of the summer (left); Mannequin with stylish hat, glasses and necklace (center); Cabinet with so much gorgeous jewelry on display (right)
- Recollection
One of the many shoe walls at Recollection (left); Snakeskin purse I ended up bringing home (center); Another gorgeous snake skin purse (right)
- Momo Vintage
Ian trying on one of the leather jackets (left); Huge selection of high quality mens jackets (center); Me looking for a new Italian bag (right)
- Desii Vintage
Ian found this fun lightning bolt shirt (left); Absolutely stunning Jimmy Choo heels (center); Just a sample of the amount of shoes and bags in the store (right)
We hope you enjoyed following along on our amazing and memorable last stop on our honeymoon in Florence, Italy! Stay tuned for blogs about our other adventures traveling through Italy!
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Xx,
The Wildjoy Team
