La Mucca Sul Tetto

The first restaurant that we ate dinner at in Florence was called La Mucca Sul Tetto (which translates to the cow on the roof). We had been given a recommendation to another restaurant, but after a couple of laps up and down the street with no luck, we were starving and picked La Mucca because I was starting to get hangry (hungry + angry=hangry). Florence has a lot of winding little streets and its very easy to get lost your first couple of days. Even though the menu looked good, we were reluctant to try this place because there was no one else in the restaurant. So we said what the hell and asked for una tavolo per due and took a seat.

Our gracious host Mario was really nice about explaining the menu and brought us a rough draft of their English version of the menu. His English was really good (as with most Italians we met). I asked him how his English was so good, and he explained that he had studied Neuroscience at Columbia University in NYC for a couple years and came back to Florence (where he was originally from), opened La Mucca with a friend/partner and was planning on taking his board exams that Saturday.

I asked for suggestions on what to eat and we told him that we had just gotten into Florence 4 hours ago, and he made suggestions on what to eat and drink and between running around hosting and tending to the kitchen, he would run back and talk to us more.

We got a plate of salami and prosciuto to start with. The stuff on the left in the picture below is called lardo I think. It's pretty much just sliced fat. The flavor is nice, but the fatty chew is kind of distracting. I couldn't finish it. Mario brought a basket of breads (seen on the right), one of which was a pistachio and saffron mini-roll. Oh mama, so good. A bottle of Branchaio and we were good to go.
He explained that the name of the restaurant was a reference to the flood scene in the Cohen Brother’s movie O’Brother Where Art Thou with the cow on the roof.

And then he showed us the Florentine T-bone bistec that he felt we should have as our first course in Firenze. He brought out the whole raw hunk of meat to show us and we couldn’t say no. Then he brought out or primi of gnocchi. I’ve never had gnocchi like this. It was so soft and pillowy, but not cheesey and so decedent that I couldn’t finish it. I asked Mario, “how?” and he explained that it’s half potato and a lot of green veggies that gave it the green color and the soft texture. So, so, SO, good. Then we got the bistec alla Fiorintina upon Mario's recommendation. We managed to kill it, but I wish we could have eaten it over 2 days. It was just to much goodness to put down in one sitting. Probably one of the best steaks I'd ever had, and Cary too.
We went back to Mucca on our last night in Florence because of our great first experience. Sadly, Mario was studying for his boards and wasn’t there, but another very nice man was there and tended to us.

For our second trip to La Mucca, our buddy from Benci made a recommendation to us about the appetizer, which was like a parmesan flan almost. I don’t remember the name of the appetizer and I never got the name of the guy from Benci.

Florentine’s are very easy to talk to get to know. More to come about the somolier from Angel’s, Mary.