Cafe Tommaseo – Trieste, Italy
Enter here, and in you go, dropping back in time to Hapsburg Trieste. Inside, you could as easily be sitting in a cafe in Vienna as on the Adriatic coast, surrounded by creamy yellow walls, just dripping with confections of plaster angels and spotty mirrors, The true elegance of the place is disrupted somewhat by someone’s unsettled idea of introducing “updated” furnishings: bamboo, the same granite that we have in our kitchen at home, but once seated, you can choose to focus on only what is good and true. I came in the late afternoon after the kitchen had closed, but was able to order the seafood appetizer pictured here.  In all fairness, the spotty, mediocre quality of the food may have had everything to do with my poor timing.
But I would come here again.  Why?  For the settled atmosphere, just to sit where James Joyce may have sat (as is the case in so many places in Trieste): where the waiter is interested in what you order and leaves you alone to contemplate  the local paper’s perspective on Barack Obama’s first visit to the Bush “Casa Bianca” in peace.  He expects you to nest, to stay awhile, out if the chilly grey day, and I for one was glad to take him up on it. On a pretty day, you could sit outside and contemplate the eternal quality of human convivium that cafe life encourages, even if you visit alone, while looking out over the old Adriatic docks, towards Venice, towards Slovenia, towards Croatia, towards ports unknown.
If you’re going:
- Address
Piazza Nicolò Tommaseo 4c, Trieste, 34121 - Telephone +39 040 362 666
- Fax: +39 040 372 5623
- Web: http://www.caffetommaseo.com/