The best cornetti in Rome

A lot has changed in terms of choice and quality since I last wrote about where to find the best cornetti in Rome, so I think it's time to update and revise that obsolete list to include some new key listings.

Every time I go on a diet (this happens quite frequently) the one food I miss the most in my weight-loss regime is the highly fatty cornetti.

Cornetti is the Italian word (but not equivalent) of croissants. They are crescent shaped, flaky, chock full of butter and sugar, and are Italy's favorite breakfast food, best enjoyed dunked in cappuccino. Yes, dunked! Ignore the judging stares of those next to you at the cafe counter.

Another popular way of enjoying cornetti is at night, after hours, consumed as a powerful sugar-boost. In my 2009 post on "cornetti" I mentioned a few helpful tricks on how to find the goods at night. This is in fact a particularly Roman thing, venturing out for a bagful of cornetti after dinner, or to recoup post steamy night dancing, or simply because we are gluttons.

Unlike croissants, which are exquisitely French, cornetti is a term that widely includes a plethora of typical Italian pastry staples, baked in a variety of shapes, sizes and containing many different fillings. Fried donuts, Danish rolls, brioches, whole wheat with honey, marmalade, or custard-filled, maritozzi slathered with whipped cream – these all belong to the baked realm of cornetti.

Every corner cafe serves cornetti in the morning. Whether delivered fresh, dusted with powdered sugar, or glazed from the wholesale baker in wide shallow boxes, or microwaved in back; bad cornetti pumped with processed crap and margarine are sold virtually everywhere. The good places, that actually bake their own artisan products were – until quite recently – a rare exception. Fortunately for me (and my nutritionist's bank account) there is an ever growing number of new places where some very good cornetti can be scored.

Here is my revised list of favorite cornetti dealers in Rome.

Coromandel - Via Monte Giordano, 60 - Tel. 06 68802461 - Open Tues–Sun 8.30am - 11.30pm
Ornella is unbeatable. This elegant bistro's baker daily produces croissants, cakes, pan brioche (which she the slices for the breakfast's French Toast) and other bakery goods. The friendly girls in aprons pouring the caffè, classy Parisian-style ambiance, terrific specials and smiling host Katia do the rest. A definite must.

Panificio Bonci - Via Trionfale 36 - Tel. 06 39734457 - Open Mon-Sat 7am to 10 pm; Sun 8am-3pm
He's done it again. Gabriele Bonci, the guru of yeast base starters and mastermind behind Pizzarium (Rome's number one quality pizza al taglio) has put together stone milled flours, French butter and alot of love, and given us cornetto fetishists the 80-gram (3 oz) cornetto of our dreams.

Bar Benaco - Via Benaco 13 - Tel. 06 8548636
I don't know what it is that makes the teensy (and expensive) cornetti baked here so special. All I know is one is never enough, despite their steep price. Flaky, buttery, not too sweet... these all-Italian cornetti are some of my all time favorites. The rest of the offer – coffee beverages – is less impressive.

Panella - Via Merulana 54 - Tel. 06 4872651 - Open Mon-Fri 8am-midnight; Sun 8.30am-4pm
Best known for its bread products, and probably the best pizza with zucchini flowers on the planet, Panella also bakes one mean cornetto. Technically perfect, the cornetti however cannot counter the staff's downright rude demeanor. The best option is getting a bag to go, and enjoying them at home with a freshly brewed cuppa.

Pasticceria Regoli - Via dello Statuto 60 - Tel. 06 4872812
This traditional bakery has been baking all sorts of pastry delights since 1916, and the house special is not properly a cornetto, rather the all-Roman maritozzo, a fragrant oblong brioche slit open and smeared full of freshly whipped cream. It doesnìt get much more Roman than that.

Cristalli di Zucchero - Via di San Teodoro 88 - Tel. 06 69920945 - Open Mon-Sun 12.30pm-3pm
This is a routine stop before (and sometimes after, too) hitting the Mercato di Campagna Amica near the Circus Maximus. Nice cornetti baked to perfection with natural starters and no chemicals or additives, as well as other sinful bakery goods. And for those who appreciate, even macarons.

Angolo Russo - Corso Sempione 13 - Tel. 06 86800686
This bakery is open all day and sells a ridiculous variety of sweets, pastries and baked goods. There's a deal if you purchase cornetti between 2 and 8 pm: 10 pieces go for a mere €4.

Pasticceria Romoli - Viale Eritrea 140 - Tel. 06 86324845 - Open Tues-Sun 6am until late
This bar-pasticceria (cafe and bakery) proverbially provides the northern suburbs with very good cornetti and similar baked goods, with a variety of fillings which may include classics like pastry cream, chocolate and jam; or the more exotic coconut cream, pistachio spread or fresh berries, apple and cinnamon, and other seasonal fruit fillings.

Palombini - Piazzale Adenauer 12 - Tel. 06 5911700 - Open daily 7am to midnight
I hardly make it to EUR – one of Rome's most modern and unique Fascist architecture neighborhoods – but when I do, Palombini is always a must: they roast their own coffee beans for espresso, and bake some of the best "cornetti alla crema" I have ever tasted.

Il Cornettone - Via Oderisi da Gubbio 215/219 - Tel. 06 5587922 - Open Thurs-Tues 7am-10pm
This is a crowded, noisy cornetto dealer. Cleanliness is not a priority, and the dangerous-looking people smoking out front make you think twice before venturing inside. The only one reason I've included this place in my list is the giant cornetto. A whole 80 centimeters (roughly 32 inches) of custom-filled flakyness.

Cornetteria Cinque 5 Stelle - Via di Tor Vergata 424 - Tel. 06 72633035
This bakery is open 24/7 and churns out 50,000 cornetti a day, plus the usual krapfen, classic pastries, cakes, mini pizzas and other savory treats for those of the less sweet persuasion.

Zozzone a Centocelle - Via dei Ginepri 16 - no phone
As one of the inner city's most popular late night hangouts, this bakery is always crowded, and impossible to park by. Blame their evening production of cornetti and brioches filled with Nutella and whipped cream. Stop drooling and read on.

Caffe Giuliani - Via Volturno 58/60 - Tel. 06 4455443
I learned of the artisan croissants, cornetti and other flaky goods baked fresh daily in this place when I was still working in the film business. We were shooting a very long and difficult scene for the movie The American (the scene never made it in the movie, ending up on the cutting room floor) and in between set-ups I perked up with numerous cornetti and espressos.

Addendums and suggestions. The first is by friend Katie Parla:
Pasticceria De Bellis - Piazza del Paradiso 56/57 - Tel. 06 68805072
I visited the bakery for the first time yesterday, and I confirm Katie's vote: in addition to the awesome deserts and pastries, the cornetti are truly stellar as well.

On the same day, I stopped by Antico Forno Roscioli, on Via dei Chiavari 34, and – besided tucking into some of their artisan panettone – I also sunk my teeth in one of their cornetti. Did not regret it at all.

My latest obsession is Le Levain in Trastevere, just off Piazza San Cosimato. All-French boulangerie bakes baguettes and all manner of cakes and desserts. But the croissants and pain-au-chocolat are what draw me the most. As if I needed another reason for wanting to live in Trastevere...

Opening photo ©instagram.com/boncipane

Cornetto Nights

When asking around for a good "cornetto" place to finish off a night in Rome, it always feels like inquiring about a Masonic lodge. Folks check you out, trying to figure out if it's OK to disclose the secret. Then furtively looking around and whispering so as not to be overheard, miraculously an address slips out of tight lips, but only if you have been deemed worthy.

Everyone has a favorite cornetto dealer, almost always located in remote whereabouts, and typically underground. Directions to these secret society hang-outs usually begin with: "Look, it's a little bit complicated". This produces the stereotype middle-of-the-night knocking on unidentifiable shut gates in seedy industrial areas of the city, climbing in mysterious elevators, challenging three headed dragons and completing wild Hercules-style tasks to be granted the privilege of sinking one's teeth in a warm, fragrant just baked cornetto - a croissant.

It is therefore with the respect of an initiate introduced to a new religion that one must approach the subject. Humbly, head bowed, eyes averted. Listening carefully to the complex directions, treasuring them, keeping them safely in one's custody and dispensing them with extreme caution.

The address to a good cornettaro—Roman slang for the typical night-shift baker that sells croissants (usually an artisanal bakery/patisserie workshop) is worth gold. The perils cornetto seekers are faced with in the wee hours of the night are always lurking. One of them is seeing your favorite cornetto pusher shutting down. Er Montacarichi in via Pietralata 159A for example, a dimly lit warehouse whose service elevator pulls patrons up into the bowels of a steaming furnace where the goods are baked, and whose street level metal shutter has been mysteriously pulled down for years now. It would be trouble if the joint were no longer in business. Throngs of aficionados and cornetto junkies willing to to cross a deserted garage and climb in the musty floor lift would be at a loss without their nightly dose.

Those who believe such things can only happen in the outskirts of town are in for a surprise. Rome is dotted with cornettari. A city ordinance scared millions of nighttime consumers earlier this year when voices started circulating that selling food in bakeries and workshops after hours was illegal.

«Il cornetto è salvo» —the croissant is saved. Rome's mayor Alemanno's thundering sentence ended the controversy lifted by news of a presumed municipal law involving historic Roman cornettari, which prohibited the sale of their tasty goods after 1:00 am. A group gathered 8000 signatures on facebook for a picket line in Campidoglio, Rome's city hall; others feared a curfew blaming Alemanno's right wing affiliations to be returning Rome to its 20-year Fascist epoch, others simply feared the Eternal City would lose its status of cornetto capital that doesn't sleep. Whatever the political agenda, croissant bakers WILL continue to stay open and sell sweetness all night. And that's all that counts.

Image courtesy of 06blog

Last night, as my son snored in dreamy slumber, I payed the nanny's silence extra cash and tiptoed out of the house. I snuck out dressed in black, feverishly anticipating the adventure. Fortunately Laboratorio Lambiase has survived the bad economy and surge in cheap bars that serve stale cornetti made with industrially manufactured frozen dough.

I arrived at 1.15 am and the place was bopping with activity. Bystanders with glazed eyes and chocolate-smeared faces stood loitering the sidewalk, the moans of pleasure grew louder as I neared the small steps of the entrance that lead the believer down to a worldly universe of sweet pleasures. An exclusive circle, open to a selected handful of lucky few. Heroic knights who do not give in to the temptation offered by the luring neon lights of the "regular" cafes along the way, populated by lonely slot machine addicts and the occasional stranded drunk, no. This is a place for lionhearts and seekers of perfection.

The house specialty at Lambiase is a danish roll baked express and served hot. It is then filled with custard, fresh whipped cream and drizzled with chocolate sauce. This awesome calorie bomb goes by the ambiguous (and cheeky) name of "Sorchetta Doppio Schizzo," which I cannot translate because I agreed to posting no adult content on this site. Let's just say the analogy is with kittens and female reproductive organs. The expression doppio schizzo is the description of the pastry's topping, and means "double squirt." The long line of triple-parked cars that obstruct Via Cernaia from midnight to dawn is the undeniable sign of Lambiase's (and their divine sorchetta specialty's) ongoing success. I saw people leaving the shop with bagfuls, and surely not for next morning's breakfast. Others were spilling in giggling and high with the perfumy air that escaped the ventilation shafts in the street. I reached the counter, asked for a sorchetta and ended up eating two. Plus took one home for Mr E.

Laboratorio Lambiase also specializes in regular croissants, krapfen (a delicious fried pastry filled with custard), donuts, puff pastry elephant ears locally called ventagli (elephant ears), bite-size spicy pizzas and rustici, which are small, assorted savory canapés.

Pasticceria Laboratorio Lambiase
Via Cernaia 47A Tel. +39 06 4941363
(please don't say I told you)

More worthy cornettari, divided by area:
Trastevere: Unnamed bakery/pastry shop on Vicolo del Cinque
Testaccio: No name pastry workshop on Via Alessandro Volta
Marconi/EUR: Il Cornettone in Via Oderisi da Gubbio; No name bakery workshop in Via Pietro Blaserna, 38
Monteverde: Unnamed pastry/bakery workshop in Via di Monteverde
Prati: Quelli della Notte on Via Leone IV; Dolce Maniera on Via Barletta, 29; Unnamed bakery workshop on Viale Angelico
Trionfale: No name bakery/pastry shop on Via Angelo Emo
Boccea: No name bakery/pastry shop on Via di Forte Bravetta
Centocelle: No name bakery/pastry shop on Via dei Platani
Parioli: Bambu's Bar on Viale Parioli; Marcucci in Piazzale Ponte Milvio

Nomentano: Pasticceria Romoli on Viale Eritrea, 140-142

L'Angolo Russo in Piazza Sempione

San Giovanni: No name bakery/pastry workshop on Via Albalonga, near Piazza Re di Roma
Cinecittà: Pasticceria Tichetti on Via Appio Claudio