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In Season 6, Episode 20 of “No Reservations,” Anthony Bourdain admits that, despite traveling throughout Italy, he had never visited Rome previously. He explains that it’s the little things and tiny details that capture the heart of a traveler visiting such a location. From Roman church bells to plates of food, Bourdain is enraptured by the city.
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Bourdain sits down at an outdoor table placed streetside to enjoy what he refers to as a quintessentially Roman dish – cacio e pepe. For a dish to garner accolades from Anthony Bourdain, it has to be good. The beloved adventurous gourmand can be seen gushing over the meal, and we can see why the man adored it.
Bourdain digs into the specialty of the house, which is served in a homemade bowl of parmesan. The waiter explains pasta water is cooked with butter and fresh black pepper before freshly made homemade pasta and Pecorino cheese is added to the mix. The recipe is finished with more Pecorino and black pepper before plated in a bowl made of Parmesan cheese. Bourdain can hardly conceal his enthusiasm over the dish brought to his table. “That’s beautiful,” he marvels before digging in. “I’m sure this is illegal somewhere,” he says after taking a bite, adding later that this sublime dish might be the “greatest thing in the history of the world.”
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Simple delicious comforts
As he eats contentedly on the sidewalk, Anthony Bourdain admits his hesitation about featuring the pasta on “No Reservations,” even suggesting that the restaurant should be concealed and renamed “Restaurant X” during filming so that he doesn’t destroy what he loves by showcasing the restaurant and its tasty cacio e pepe. “Holy crap, that’s good,” he murmurs while considering what he would be willing to sacrifice in his past to enjoy this satisfying plate of pasta.
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Of course, in our internet age, it isn’t difficult to find that Bourdain enjoyed his eating experience at Sparita, and the restaurant continues to crank out dishes of the cheesy pasta to overwhelmingly positive reviews. Expect to shell out around $16 for an order of cacio e pepe, and make reservations — unlike the title of Bourdain’s show, his spotlight helped boost the popularity of this establishment and it has since become a common stop for other similarly-minded, hungry traveling foodies.
In the rest of the episode, Bourdain noshes on freshly made mozzarella, crusty loaves of bread, and thinly sliced prosciutto, which, even if you don’t hop on a plane to Europe, you can serve alongside the plates of bucatini cacio e pepe you make for yourself at home while reading Bourdain’s book “No Reservations” from the comfort of your own kitchen.
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