Traveling to Italy means you can pig out on all the delicious Italian food the country has to offer. When visiting Bergamo, there are plenty of places to eat, but it can be tempting to go way over budget by eating all day, every day. Luckily, you can still eat to your heart’s content and be easy on your wallet with these cheap places to eat in Bergamo, Italy.
Related » Things to do in Citta Alta, Bergamo
Casoncelli alla Bergamasca
This is the local pasta from the Bergamo region. It is similar to a meat-filled ravioli, covered with a butter and bacon sauce. Topped with freshly grated parmesan cheese, and you’ve got a delicious Bergamo specialty. Practically every restaurant in Bergamo will serve casoncelli but at varying quality and prices. Most restaurants have menus available to peruse before getting a table, so you can shop around for a casoncelli that’s within your budget.
Caffetteria Corsarola
After looking over several menus, I found a restaurant that served casoncelli for a price that I was comfortable with (€7,50). With an adorable outdoor patio in the back, Caffetteria Corsarola was a great place to sample this local favorite.
And you better believe I ate this whole plate of pasta.
…and probably could have eaten another
Polenta e Osei
Another local specialty from the Bergamo area is Polenta e Osei. First created in 1910, Polenta e Osei is an almondy sponge cake with a light chocolate-hazelnut filling, wrapped in a yellow, sugar-coated marzipan and topped with a little chocolate bird. You’ll see them in the shop windows of bakeries in Bergamo. They come in lots of different sizes, so you can either have a small one to sample or a larger cake to take home and nibble on for several days.
Panificio Tresoldi
This is one of the more popular bakeries in Citta Alta, Bergamo. Located just past the main square of Piazza Vecchia, the Polenta e Osei in the window will draw you in. This particular Polenta e Osei had an appealing crunch with the outer sugar layer. One small one was just enough to get a taste of the dessert and have my sweet tooth satisfied for a while. Each cake was only €3!
Sugary Italian deliciousness
Nessi Bergamo Alta
This is another popular bakery in Citta Alta, due to is close proximity to the funicular that brings you to this part of Bergamo. Nessi serves many different sizes of Polenta e Osei, including this giant one in the photo below. I found this cake to be a little fluffier and fresher tasting, but it did cost more than at Panificio Tresoldi, at €3,90.
Humungo cake!
Cannoli
Cannolis are one of my favorite Italian desserts. There are days I feel like I could sit down and plow through a bowl of cannoli cream. Cannolis are traditionally from the Sicily area, but you can find them all over Italy.
To make a cannoli you deep fry some pastry dough in the shape of a tube. Then, fill the inside of the tube with a sweet ricotta filling. Some people add chocolate chips or orange peel to the filling for a little something extra. Prices of cannoli usually depend on what size it is and what filling is inside. I found them to be €2-4 around Citta Alta Bergamo.
Nessi Bergamo Alta
At the same bakery where you find Polenta di Osei, you can get delicious cannolis. The ricotta cream inside has just the right amount of sweetness and the outer shell has a great crunch. It’s a great snack to pick up while hiking up to the Parco della Rocca.
Pizza
You can’t visit Italy and not eat pizza, am I right?? I was so excited for pizza that I ate it for breakfast and had zero shame about it.
Pizza looks and tastes a little bit different, depending on where in Italy you have it, and what kind of pizza each restaurant specializes in. For example, Pizza Napoletana looks and tastes different than Pizza Siciliana, but they’re both Italian pizzas. In Bergamo, you can find a few different styles of pizza, so try a few and find your favorite!
Il Fornaio
Il Fornaio is one of the popular cheap places to eat in Bergamo. The windows are filled with dozens of pizzas and the smell wafts out onto the cobblestone streets. It’s hard to resist going inside. Il Fornaio serves Pizza al Taglio, meaning “pizza by the slice”. You just let them know what kind you want and how many slices, and they will cut off your portion, heat it up and serve it to you hot ‘n greasy! If you can find a table at the back of the store, that’s great but I recommend taking your pizza to the nearby Piazza Vecchia and eating it in the square. For meal of margherita pizza and a bottle of coke, I paid only €4,70.
So many flavors to choose from!
Pizzeria alla Fara
Another delicious spot in Bergamo is Pizzeria alla Fara. This place is much smaller and tucked off the main drag in Citta Alta. But that just makes it so much more wonderful! For only €2,50 per slice, this is a great place to find a cheap meal. There is no place to sit and eat, but you can take your pizza down the hill to Parco della Fara and have lunch with a view over the city below.
Too excited to remember to take a photo before chowing down… Classic Brianna.
Gelato
Remember that pizza I had for breakfast? I polished it off with a helping of gelato. Sorry, not sorry.
Gelato is another must-have while traveling through Italy. You’ll find gelato everywhere and it’s a perfect treat to help cool off from those hot Italian summers. Gelato is a denser, creamier version of ice cream that comes in tons of different flavors. It’s really easy to find gelato in Bergamo and there are many locations that sell it. In Citta Alta, there are two main gelaterias that you’ll want to visit.
Gelateria Cherubino
This was my favorite place to get gelato. I may or may not have gone here twice in one day. For the low, low price of €2 you can get two scoops of gelato. This can either be two scoops of one flavor or one scoop of two different flavors. Note: If you’re going to go the two flavors route, make sure you pick flavors that go well together! My 100% favorite flavor was Variegated Cherry. Holy cow. It was like a sweet cream gelato with tart black cherry pie filling mixed in. So flippin good.
Seriously the best gelato I’ve ever had
Dei Mille
Another popular place to get gelato is Dei Mille. It is located in Piazza Vecchia, so it can get crowded with people, but it’s still worth a try! Here, you can get a baby-sized cup with one flavor for €1,50. I visited this location during midday when the sun was quite warm. I recommend going with either fruity or citrus flavors when eating gelato in hot weather. These flavors are typically less dense and more refreshing in the heat. This limoncello gelato was the perfect afternoon snack!
Nothin’ like a little limoncello in the afternoon
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32 Comments
I love it!! I always feel super proud and honoured when people discover my hometown and actually enjoy it! I also read your “things to do in Bergamo” post. Thank you for sharing, in my opinion, it’s such a small gem compared to messy Milan or other overcrowded beauty nearby (lake Como, Verona, Venice…).
I loved Bergamo and would totally go back! I didn’t do much exploring in Citta Bassa because I just loved the historical feel of Citta Alta!
Hi..
Amazing food pictures. i love Italian food. Are you interested in Indian food?
Is India in your travelling list?
Thanks
OMG everything looks so incredible. Cannoli are my weakness!!! I’ve been trying to make a trip to Italy for the last year but I think this pushed me to finally do it 🙂
Unbelievable Italian Food and cheap…you had me at hello!! I have never heard of Casoncelli alla Bergamasca but I love meat ravioli and butter and bacon..your killing me smalls!!
By the way is that smoked salmon on pizza, that looks amazeballs!
As a Italian happy expat, I can’t help feeling happy when I find such well-written posts about a town that’s super close to my place of birth 🙂
Ahhh I LOVE Italy with all my heart! I haven’t been there in years, and I’m dying to go back now! Great post 🙂 xx
http://hollyhabeck.com
Mmmmmm. I all looks amazing! Italy is on my bucket list!
Yummy, everything looks so tasty. I love the pasta and pizza!
You had me at gelato! I always get cannoli for my birthday, can’t imagine how delightful an actual Italian cannoli would be!
OK pinning this post for future trips and now officially starving lol! EVERYTHING looks incredible! I love cannolis, they’re my favorite Italian dessert too, but I don’t really like orange so I am always sad when there’s a ton of orange on it.
I’m not big on the orange either. I prefer chocolate 🙂
YUM!! Everything looks delicious but that pizza really perked my attention! My husband and I have goals of traveling to Italy someday. Looks like an amazing trip!
I haven’t been to Italy yet, but it is on my list. I would be one of those people that totally overspend eating as I’d want to try everything! Saving this for the future and I so want to try Polenta e Osei!
Thanks for sharing your budget tips. I’d love to just eat out effect day in Italy. Now I don’t feel as bad. And the marzipan polenta dish sounds delectable.
One of my favorite things about Italy is the food. I love me some Gelato and Cannolis. I haven’t had the Polenta e Osei. NOw I have a reason to go back. Like one ever needs an excuse to go to Italy. LOl
Right? Guess I haaaaave to go to Italy and eat food….
It’s amazing how well we can eat in Italy and in a budget. Anytime I’ve traveled I’m gone where the locals are and the open markets. They’re gems.
Ok I want to eat everything in these photos! Thanks for the tips – I would totally spend my whole budget on food in Italy!
I’ve never been to Italy but if I do, a lot of these places will be on my list! They look so good 🙂
All the photos look so tempting! Next time in Italy, I must try all these 🙂
Carbs are my weakness so this post made me really hungry. I have never been to Italy, but the Casoncelli alla Bergamasca caught my attention, even more than the pizza (gasp!). I need to get better at finding cheap when I travel though, you did really well!
Carbs are LIFE
Love all of these! Pigging out in Italy is probably one of the ways to experience the country. I love Italian food and even went on a food tour when we visited Rome. It was amazing.
Pinned this post for later. Gotta check out your recommendations when we go back there. 🙂
This is excellent! I love to eat and trying dishes in countries I visit is one of my favorite things to do. You list in here a lot of the things I enjoy eating like cannoli and gelato. And, the prices are so affordable! It is a win-win situation.
I hate your post! You made me drooling and it’s almost midnight in my place. I want to devour all of those foods. And you found the best places to find them. Great job! Love your post!
Hahah Sorry! There’s nothing wrong with a late night plate of pasta though… 😉
Such a comprehensive list. Is going to be very useful. The gelato and the pizzas look mouthwatering. We had wonderful time trying these delicacies in Rome and Florence this year, definitely they were costlier compared to what you have presented here
Oh how I miss Italy! Sadly when I visited back in 2012 all the shops closed early in the evening so my friends and I had to walk around to find restaurants that would stay open past 8 :/ hoping to actually try some gelato when I go back!
I’m guilty of being officially hungry now!! I like how casoncelli looks, will try it for sure, but the cheaper one you recommended 😉 That cannoli looks utterly delicious, surely going to try that, well besides pizza and gelato..hellooo how can I visit Italy and not relish these two 😀 In my first trip to Paris, I literally struggled with the traditional food items because of culture difference plus lack of knowledge, so I’ll not do that on my next trips 🙂 so pinning this post!!
Wow such a nice post! Thank you for sharing! I love all of the photos, foods that are featured looks really mouth- watering and I am actually starving right now! That whole plate of pasta, pizza, and gelato really looks delicious. Again, thanks for sharing this informative post.
I don’t know what I want to try more — the pasta, pizza, cannoli, or gelato? They all look so delicious. I’m not surprised you ate the whole plate of pasta. I totally would, too!