ristorazione — Acqui Terme · Piemonte
Among the hills of Monferrato, in Acqui Terme, there is an address that many local workers know by heart: a tavola calda (casual eatery serving hot meals) where home-style cooking is not a slogan but the plan for every morning, open Monday to Saturday.
Il Ghiotto is run by Maria Miraglia, with the direct presence and readiness that only a family-run kitchen can offer every day. Those who arrive late, even after two in the afternoon, are welcomed with grace and still find something good: not an extraordinary gesture, but the ordinary rhythm of an open house, where no one is turned away empty-handed.
At lunch, Monday to Saturday, there is only one menu: first course, second course, side dish, dessert or fresh fruit, water and coffee. Thirteen euros, a price that regular customers remember unchanged for years — a quiet pact between whoever cooks every morning and whoever sits down at the table, rarer than one might think in an age of constant price rises.
The fresh pasta is worked by hand every morning: the fettuccine with zucchini sauce that appears in reviews is the mark of a kitchen that delegates nothing to the ready-made or the industrial. Ingredients are chosen with care, and are the first thing customers notice — above average, they write, and in a tavola calda that is no small compliment.
The plate that arrives at the table tells all of this: home cooking, a price that time has not touched, a place worth returning to. The full page is here.
