Italy has delicious food, wonderful wine and great coffee. But if you don’t want to stand out as a tourist and you want to avoid to get ripped off, here are some important dos and don’ts to follow when you are travelling and eating in Italy.

• Don’t sit down at the bar for coffee: No joke. Take your espresso or cappuccino standing at the bar if you don’t want to see the price triple. Once you sit down you pay the service – and instead of 1 Euro for your espresso you might rise up to 5 Euro if you are in a touristic area. If you are too tired to stand up after hours of sight seeing,  take a look at the price list usually exposed behind the counter.

• Water :  It is unusual to order tap water in a restaurant. Order a big bottle for everybody which usually costs only 2-4 Euro.

• Don’t order cappuccino after your meal: The milk foam is considered too heavy for the stomach after a lunch or dinner. So if you don’t want to out yourself as the strange foreigner go for espresso.

• Ketchup: Never ever ask for ketchup in a restaurant. Unless you ordered french fries – which is already a shame since you have way better options when eating in Italy.

• Don’t eat close to a tourist site: Food is usually bad or at the most average close to the Colosseum or the Ponte Vecchio. The best restaurants are oftenfurther away from where all the tourists go through.

• You don’t have to order it all: As a friend from abroad put it: “It took me a few months in Italy to realize I don’t have to order antipasti, primo, secondo and dolce”. You can simply go for antipasto and fish or meat or have a primo and desert. If the waiter insists proposing you more and more, stick to your choice of the menu.

• Bread: Bread is used to accompany the food, not as an apetizer with sauces – unless you ordered bruschetta. And if you are not in a really fancy restaurant it is completely legal to dip your bread in the delicious pasta sauce left on the plate.

• Distrust candles and fancy tablecloths: Often the best food is served in simple Trattorias with horrible paper tablecloth and plastic chairs. This is true especially in the Italian countryside.

• Tipping in Italy: Keep in mind: In Italy the waiters are payed already and don’t live on their tips. But if you have been nice to you and haven’t ripped you off you are free to tip.  10 percent is considered already a big tip in Italy. But if service (“servizio”) has been charged on your bill, don’t leave anything.

Buon appetito !

ByItaly