Rome is having a moment right now as European Union cash is being splashed on sprucing up piazzas, putting in bike lanes and scraping soot off ancient monuments. New taxi licences also mean that for the first time in years you might actually be able to find a cab. As a resident of Rome I have a list of tips for visitors, but, when it comes to food, instead of recommending the usual suspects for the best traditional pizza, gelato and coffee, all of which are ranked repeatedly on the internet (yes, Sant’ Eustachio Caffè is great for coffee), here are a few lesser-known foodie spots I tell friends and colleagues to investigate when they arrive.
Best carbonara: Pipero
Tom being served a carbonara by Alessandro Pipero
Legend has it that carbonara pasta made with eggs and pork cheek was invented in Rome when American soldiers in the city at the end of the Second World War asked for a breakfast dish resembling bacon and eggs. Either way it is now central to Roman cuisine and trattorias including Da Carlone in Trastevere and Da Danilo in Esquilino can lay claim to offering the best. But if you fancy a splurge, try the sublime version at the Michelin-starred Pipero Roma on Corso Vittorio in the centre, where it comes as part of an £85 three-course lunch deal (piperoroma.it). The secret is the way the chef fries large chunks of pork cheek, draining the fat from the pan to leave non-greasy, light and crispy chunks that are soft inside. “Foie gras is good. However, at 10am or midnight you wouldn’t eat it, but you would eat carbonara,” says the patron Alessandro Pipero, adding: “There is good food, fantastic food and wow food. Carbonara is wow food.”
Best cake: Pasticceria Boccione
Pasticceria Boccione has been run by the same family for five generations
ALAMY
Rome’s old Jewish ghetto has been Disneyfied in recent years as “authentic, traditional” Jewish restaurants pop up overnight, filling the main street with hundreds of tables. But amid the chaos the tiny, spartan-looking Pasticceria Boccione bakery — run by the same family for five generations — stands unchanged, still turning out slices of warm ricotta and wild cherry cake and large squares of slightly burnt scones loaded with candied fruit, nuts and raisins (Via del Portico d’Ottavia). The entrance is easy to miss — keep a look-out for the chunks of ancient Roman temple built into the façade of the building. I was there early on a freezing cold Sunday morning recently to check everything was still delicious — it was — and found the usual queue of locals getting their fix before the tourists arrived. It is said Pope Benedict was a fan and would send assistants across the Tiber from the Vatican to get in line.
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Best offal: La Campana
Trippa alla romana is a traditional regional dish
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This is not for the squeamish, but offal is Rome’s real signature dish, thanks to the Vatican taking all the best cuts of meat for itself down the centuries, leaving the locals to get inventive with the offcuts. I get my regular helping at La Campana, a 500-year-old restaurant with white tablecloths and handwritten menus once frequented by Goethe and Picasso that spills out into a tiny piazza in the heart of town. Order the sublime “animelle” or sweetbread, which is a bit of a euphemism since we are talking about glands from the throats of lambs. If you can handle that, you are in for a treat. Seared on a hotplate, the creamy, scallop-like morsels arrive on a bed of rocket, singed on the outside and soft on the inside, dressed only in oil, salt and pepper (£16; ristorantelacampana.shop).
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Best pizza bianca: L’Antico Forno Di Fontana Di Trevi
Pizza al taglio is popular with locals
ANDREA DI LORENZO
Romans eat a lot of “pizza al taglio”, which is ready-to-go hot pizza bought by the slice and eaten on the move. In the morning, hungry office workers and school kids will go for the pared-down version — pizza bianca — slices of fresh-out-of-the-oven pizza dough. Roscioli near Campo dei Fiori has a right to call its version one of the best. It is light and has just the right amount of salt and olive oil. But I have long been faithful to the pizza bianca turned out by L’Antico Forno Di Fontana Di Trevi, a bakery near my office that does well-priced slices despite being ringside to the hellish tourist hordes by the Trevi fountain. Go to the counter at the back and ask for its pizza bianca topped with rosemary or sesame seeds. At the counter by the door staff split open slices and stuff them with mortadella and crumbled pistachio (£2 a slice; anticoforno.it).
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Best maritozzo: Pasticceria Regoli 
Maritozzo is a brioche filled with whipped cream
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For a real Roman breakfast, try a brioche filled with whipped cream — the maritozzo, a classic in the Eternal City, which, depending on which story you believe, was once handed out to medieval pilgrims or used to woo potential brides by young men who would hide a ring in the cream. The ultimate spot for the maritozzo has long been Pasticceria Regoli, a small bakery on Via dello Statuto with an adjoining café where you can order a maritozzo to go with your coffee (£3). The place has been doing a brisk trade in Esquilino since 1916. It’s handily situated halfway between the must-see basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore — which is so opulent Pope Francis was buried there last year — and the Colle Oppio Park, which offers great views over the Colosseum.
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Best street market: Mercato Trionfale
Mercato Trionfale has 280 stall holders
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If you fancy stocking up on cheese, tomatoes and salami for a picnic (use a rosetta roll, which is hollow inside, ready to be filled), one choice is the lively Testaccio market which has a viewing point where you can glimpse down at an excavated ancient Roman warehouse packed with amphorae, which the market is built on top of. The growing number of food stands selling regional gourmet snacks are fun, but are slowly edging out traditional stall holders, so if you want to see the real deal head to the majestic Mercato Trionfale near the Vatican — reportedly the biggest in Italy — where 280 stands are piled high with seasonal veg, mozzarella, fresh pasta and olive oil while butchers and fishmongers yell out their prices to local shoppers. Sit-down foodie stands are also slowly moving in here, but are still relegated to the rear of the market, where you can gorge on arrosticini meat skewers from Abruzzo, steaming porchetta slices and sizzling fish snacks in cardboard tubs.