Pastificio on Via Della Croce, Rome

Now that was my kind of treasured find. We noticed this pasta shop a few days back (Via Della Croce 8) with a chalkboard written in Italian suggesting some kind of a tasting session for €4 (US$5), but we couldn't quite figure out what the rest of it said aside from something about 1 PM. Today we incidentally happened to pop down here at 12:50 PM and found a bunch of people sitting around as if they were waiting for something. Then, exactly ten minutes later, we found out why.

A guy from the back of the pasta shop came out with a huge tray of cooked pasta, and suddenly everyone got up and formed a line. He went back and got another tray of gnocchi while he was at it, and then he started serving your choice on plastic plates. The tomato sauce-based gnocchi was fine, but the noodles were fantastic thanks to that freshly ground black pepper and bits of pork littered throughout it. It definitely was not for anyone with an aversion toward a heavy swine fat taste, but I gobbled it up with pleasure. Locals clearly knew the routine enough to check out what he was selling today and relaying it to their friends - the tray of noodles sold out within the first 15 minutes.

So what was it that was written on that chalkboard? After a quick check on Google Translate, it looks like it was indeed a product tasting at 1 PM. But the funny thing is that it went so far as to explicitly state that it included one cup, fork, and napkin, which they handed out in little plastic cutlery sets. And the best part? In addition to free water, it included wine. One simply helped himself to a flask up at the front and poured it into that aforementioned plastic cup. Gotta love it.