Back in April 2018 I published my travel bucket list on my blog. Many of those items on the list are a distance dream now that I have two small children, but there was one that was definitely achievable and when we booked our holiday to Puglia, I could finally tick it off.
Straight after confirming our holiday to Borgo Egnazia, we booked Grotta Palazzese aka the cave restaurant in Polignano a Mare, Puglia. To give some background to Grotta Palazzese, the venue is a unique restaurant with a terrace actually inside a natural cave! A place used for banquets since 1700 for parties and banquets, it has an absolutely magical atmosphere. And this isn’t some gimmicky tourist trap but also a fine dining experience with refined Apulian food.
The restaurant also welcomes children though specifies the early 6pm sitting to reserve the later times for more romantic diners. This was fine with me as I knew getting there early would mean great photos in daylight and our pick of tables. On the day of our reservation it poured with rain and I feared that my amazing bucket list experience hung in the balance! Borgo Egnazia had organised us a car to the restaurant, around half an hour away, and as the rain was still coming down I had mild feelings of trepidation.
However, I needn’t have worried as the weather started to clear shortly after we arrived and we were able to see the restaurant in all it’s glory.
In all my years of visiting restaurants I’ve never been anywhere like this, it was truly magical! From the dining on the terrace to actually inside the cave, to be honest every seat was a good one!
Our spot with a view over the Adriatic Sea was truly spectacular and you can see that Noah agreed!
Diners must chose from one the five tasting menus though it is possible to mix and match and choose a semi a la carte menu. The menus range from the most expensive ‘Gold’ which is 350EURO to the middle option the ‘Essenza’ for 235EURO and then three menus at 195EURO. We chose one of the latter, the Instinto menu which is mainly seafood. All are available with wine pairing but we opted out of this favouring to just order by the glass.
The children also had to have a tasting menu (there’s no other option) for 100EURO and baby Noah was free.
I saw a lot of talk on social media on how this restaurant is style over substance and it’s really expensive with subpar food. I beg to disagree! I’ll describe the food in more detail but just to say overall we were incredibly impressed by it and honestly when you’re used to London fine dining prices, then the prices here are hardly ludicrous.
Before we started a huge bread selection was placed on our table which was immediately got stuck into!
The adult starter was scallop, topinambur, sour cream and truffle while the children began with prosciutto and mozzarella. A very generous portion too, both were very tasty!
Adult second course was an absolutely divine raviolo cacio e pepe, red prawn and caviar concept while kids enjoyed orecchiette with tomato sauce.
At this point it was getting darker and the twinkling lights added to the beauty of the restaurant.
Main course was served sea bass, spinach, black garlic and herb bread for us and chicken Milanese with fries for the littles.
Our dessert was a modern Tiramisu whereas the kids were very pleased with their scoops of ice cream!
Of course, getting the bill was the less thrilling element of the occasion and something I’d read about was the eye watering price tag for mediocre food. The food was actually excellent and we enjoyed every course, and the bill though pricey was for us no different the high end London restaurants that we’re used to.
We had a wonderful time and the restaurant’s combination of natural beauty, charming atmosphere and wonderful food made this one of best ever restaurant experiences. We also loved how this wasn’t just something that adults could enjoy and we could also bring our kids!
