La Mamma

Description:

• This Italian restaurant may not be a trattoria in Florence, but it's about as close as you're going to get in Luxor. The space is open on two sides to a courtyard with a fountain, and the decor is slightly downmarket, with big posters of the Colosseum and Tuscan girls in peasant dress, and wine barrels lined up over the bar. The staff are warm and friendly, and the wine list includes some Italian bottles (albeit at around LE400/$73/£37, due to exorbitant import duties). Start off with a plate of fresh buffalo mozzarella with basil and Egyptian olive oil and, unless you're very hungry (the dishes are not small), choose a pasta or a meat dish. The fettucine alla carbonara is a little heavy on the sauce, but it's tasty and the pasta nicely al dente. If you don't feel like pasta, try the pollo alla panna (the sauce is rich and flavorful and loaded with fresh mushrooms) or the rack of lamb in rosemary sauce. If you're still insufficiently stuffed at this point, try piling in a desert of sautéed apples on puff pastry with Pernod. You can work it off the next day trekking around some temples.

• © Frommer's 2013