Quattro Leoni is located in the Santo Spirito area of Florence, or as many know it, across the bridge. I had heard so many good things about this restaurant, so I knew I had to make my way over. There are many great restaurants in the Santo Spirito area, so I was very excited to try Quattro Leoni out.
To start off we got the house red (a staple at every dinner). The house red was a chianti classico and had the “black rooster” picture on it, which meant it authentically came from the Chianti region of Italy. In terms of food, we got a cheese board to share. It was truly a great, generous selection of cheeses, and all the pecorinos were tasty. The sweet jam on the board was a great pairing with everything. The sweet and savory flavors went well together. In general, the cheese boards we had ordered at other restaurants were underwhelming or small, but this one didn’t disappoint.
Next, for primi, we got two pastas to share. If you are hungry, I recommend you don’t share, get your own. Now, we had heard a lot of noise about this pear-stuffed pasta in a sauce of taleggio cheese and asparagus, so we were 100% getting that. The other pasta we got was a pici with sausage and fennel. Both were great pastas. However, the pear pasta stood out because it was something different from what I’ve had before. Pear and pasta is a weird combination, but they made it work at Quattro Leoni. This was a fantastic pasta. The cheese sauce was a nice combo with the pear inside the pasta. It was similar to the sweet and savory flavor that we had on the cheese board. The pici was also really good, but you can find similar pici dishes like this one all over the city.
Takeaways: The clear winners here were the cheese board and the pear-stuffed pasta. The menu changes here, but these two are staples. I would make a reservation if you want to dine here because it tends to fill up quickly.
Score: 8.4/10
a dude eats abroad 