Praiano
Il Rifugio

Il Rifugio

Via Guglielmo Marconi 45, Praiano, Italy, 84010

Caffè • Pizza • Porta Via • Formaggio


"We were trying to get to the end of the Path of the God hike and for some weird reason we took a wrong turn and ended up in Praiano (currently Yelp says this place is in Arienzo but this is wrong. Il Rifugio is in Praiano and even Trip Advisor got it right: tripadvisor.com/Restaura… . I hope Yelp fixes this glitch soon. We came across a local named Domenico who highly recommended the place. The restaurant has a nice ocean view and it's not too far from the Sita Bus stop if you plan on riding it to go to other cities like Amalfi or Positano. The place is tiny and cute and we were happy that we went there when it wasn't crazy busy. The owner, Aldo, was rocking to current US pop hits on his radio and we found it adorable that he was singing along to the songs. He was really friendly and attentive and it felt like we visiting a jolly uncle. I ordered the spaghetti con vongole (clams and it was the best clam pasta I have ever tasted. It had just the right amount of garlic and I love the butter sauce that smothered the pasta. The pasta was perfectly al dente. Even my husband kept stealing bites from my dish. Aldo didn't skimp on the clams either and I had plenty on my plate. My husband ordered the Prosciutto do Parma pizza with extra basil. We also got served another pizza (because my husband accidentally told Aldo he wanted two pizzas , but the other one had some type of ham. Both were good and had the right meat to cheese to sauce ratio. I also liked that the pizza crust tasted good. For dessert, we shared a traditional torte that had an interesting hint of citrus (perhaps bergamot? . it wasn't too sweet either which is why I really liked it. I later found out from our bed and breakfast that it was a traditional Easter torte that we ate. The owner hooked us up with some limoncello which we thought was very sweet of him to do. He said he made the limoncello himself and we thought that was pretty impressive. When we are back in Italy, we are definitely interested in taking one of his cooking classes (Aldo said he hosts cooking classes regularly . I would love to learn how to make the vongole pasta and his yummy Easter torte."