Osteria Nonna Dora in Palermo

Waitress recommended the involtini di spada so I gave it a try! I was not expecting it to be bland, dry, fish meatballs. Had to ask for salt and they still weren’t very good. Caponata was delicious. The pasta con le sarde was also not good. Had a strange flavor I can’t even explain, but it was a problem with the seasonings and not the actual fish. We also tried the fried seafood which was underwhelming, we’ve had better from street vendors. All in all, not worth the hype based on what we tried.

the food may be good, but unfortunately we waited 20 minutes at the table and asked twice that we wanted to place an order, but we were ignored by the service. I will add that there was not much traffic.

Sadly we were a bit disappointed by Nonna Duria. Pros are that the prices were really reasonable and the aubergine parmigiana we shared as a starter was delicious. Cons were that neither our pasta dishes (pistachio pesto and pesto with auberginewere nice at all. They were very heavy and greasy - the portions were huge but in what felt like a slightly obscene way when they didn’t actually taste good at all. I think the way to go in Palermo is street food!

Big disappointment!It is not worth waiting for a table - mainly for tourists. I had the impression of selected people at the entrance.Initially, the Caponata tasted strange (bitter and carbonated- it turned out to be spoiled. The waiters agreed.Frittura Mista - poor quality, small, little and not very nice smelling. Gummy squid, shrimp with not the first quality and freshness.Service - a waitress ineptly kicking a napkin under the counter so that it cannot be seen. Waiters bored, negatively commenting on customers.I definitely do not recommend it

Really good authentic cuisine at surprisingly reasonable prices. Great service too.

Huge portions of yummy food that makes you feel right and home and so so good!

Great italian and cheap food. Giant portions, but you can take a break and eat it later :Great and pleasant staff. Reservation is necessary, but you will be satisfied. Restaurant is clean, and beautiful.

Really delicious Sicily cousine.A reservation is required.

Waiters are incredibly rude, they refuse you a table if you by yourself even with 4 tables free. Not even a kind talk. You get there and ask. "A table for 1 please " and they rudely reply Extremely arrogant, " for you, No"! Just like that. Makes you feel so not welcome. I came with a ideia of spending well and try the best, spending more then what 2 people would. They lost a good costumer. So so rude.

Very fresh and tasty food, good quality of ingredients, service is great, price-performance ratio is very very good.

A traditional and very popular restaurant. Make sure you make a reservation in advance since it tends to be very busy. The servings are very big. A little bit lacking in taste in my opinion.

Very nice and popular Tratoria , food is very tasty and traditional , very generous . Simple menu , and very sweet prices . Very good adress for and quick lunch or diner in the center .

Amazing service and delicious food. Not overly expensive. Would definitely return if/when we visit Palermo again!

Really good local food! Trust me the 5€ pasta is more than enough, even though the antipasti is pretty tasty as well. Reservation recommended.

I can absolutely recommend this restaurant. The prices are low and the food is excellent. The portions are also sufficient. Wine lovers will also get their moneys worth with the extensive selection. There is only one small drawback: the restaurant is extremely popular, which is why I recommend a reservation.

Our experience at Nonna Dora wasnt very pleasant. First of all, we waited 30-40 minutes until a waiter came and asked us what we would like to eat. They didnt even came to apologize or give us something to drink in the waiting time.After that, we ordered antipasti as well as pasta afterwards as main course. The portions are just waaay too big, and for a climate aware woman like me, that hurts me to see, because I doubt that a lot of people are able to finish it, and therefore the leftovers will just get thrown away. This is very unfortunate.The waiters didnt seem to communicate at all and they seemed very confused. They came to ask if we would like some coffee before leaving, and we hadnt even gotten our main course yet.Also the food didnt taste special. Actually it didnt really taste of anything at all. So I would rather that you size down the portions and focus on the taste instead..Would not recommend.

Disappointed with this place. They messed up every single item in our order and got annoyed at us when we would send things back. They brought our main dishes while we were still eating the antipasti but I was almost done eating my meat when they brought the side dish… The food was fine but there are much better places to eat at in Palermo. I won’t go back.

Lovely spot, not too crowded or expensive. Giant pasta portions.

It is a very nice place. We ordered pasta and we received very big plates that were very tasty and generous. Waiters speak English and were very helpful. We went one day and it was full so we had to make a reservation for the next day, it was worth it. Recommended.

One of the best restaurants till now!!

Great value and tasty pasta but portions are huge so consider doing half/half. Fried fish platter was excellent!

Not worth the high rating and consistently busy service - confused why it is listed so high on Google. Food was poor - yes the portions are large but the pasta is seriously underwhelming. The salad - dont bother. Its just washed iceberg lettuce, the other salad has dried mint they add and both were very rubbish.The service is equally as poor, unfortunately the staff look like they dont want to be there and purposefully dont give you eye contact so you never get served. Everything took a length, and after a bad meal experience we just wanted to leave.

Me and my company were looking forward to this restaurant our entire trip and we then finally got the chance to eat here. To say the least we were very disappointed. The service was okay but the food wast just so so bland. No flavors at all, we took the sword fish which was just filled with some kind of un-fried crumbs and tasted nothing like fish and the octopus was like rubber and lacked any type of taste. The dishes weren’t complete meals so you had to order additional side dishes. We took some salad and it was literally just some chopped tomatoes and big chunks of lettuce. The best thing was the POTATOES (side orderand that’s just crazy for a place that had the reputation of ”fresh fish”. Good list of wines but that’s irrelevant if the food is bad. We are beyond disappointed and would never go back!

The review is only for the staff behavior. The restaurant closes at 11:30PM and we were here at 9:20PM. We wait so long and the waitress comes to us at 10PM and says they cant offer us a table as kitchen closes at 10:30PM. So then we asked if we can have takeaway. Without checking the in the kitchen they bluntly said no. I am not sure if they were being lazy, racist or something else. I guess they wasted time of around 10-12 people like us.

This place will fulfil you pasta fantasies but beware, these are monster pastas. Had the chick pea pancake thing and the eggplant parm and a couple pastas. Everything was tremendous. The chick pea pancake dish was shockingly refined. Great great price for the quality and portions. This place gets busy on weekends so plan ahead to get a table and make all of your Sicilian food dreams come true.

Every single course was great. Generous portions and delicious pastas. One of our best meals in Palermo!Loved the Bolognese!

The food here was actually pretty good, their menu did have an English sub so it was easy to order as a tourist. Food came out quickly. We did receive a wrong item, we asked for a grilled squid instead of the fry one, after informing this to one of the waiter it took them about 5minute for then to discuss the matter before sending a waiter who can speak English to rectify the problem. Would recommend it.

We had such a great meal here. I recommend this place to anyone travelling to Palermo, the food is fantastic and there is a great ambience. Especially try the Melanzane starter and the fish dishes. Book a table to avoid disappointment as it gets very busy.

We ordered pesce spada and frittura mista. It was really super tasty and fresh, each bite was a pleasure. We received our meals in 15 minutes. It’s probably the best trattoria in Palermo. One tip: book a table 1-2 days earlier as it’s really busy place.

Really not sure what the hype is about or how the rating is so high. Very so so food and you have to make a reservation a day in advance for dinner. We saw them turn away so many customers.The price is reasonable and the portion is large but it really doesn’t taste that good. I would never come back.

Mamma Mia. Who knew Italian food could be this delicious. I had the spaghetti Bolognese and hear me when I say it was the nicest Ive ever eaten. The portion was almost too big and I am a large Irish male. My bébè got the pasta Al Norma which she scoffed down greedily. Bravo!

The portions are huge the prices are low the quality is below average. I would rather have had half the size portions with average quality especially given the easily available fresh ingredients. Good for people that want a cheap big meal on a low price.

Very nice place to enjoy Sicily foods for reasonable priceI recommend the melanza especially it was really delicious

Huge portions! Food was a tad heavy and sweet for my liking, but perhaps its just because im not really used to eating pistachio pasta - so take this review with a pinch of salt. The burrata was really nice though.

Can I marry the food here? :)This place is a rare local find. Everything that I excpect and wish for a restaurant.The dishes are creative and local, not complicated, quite simple but have amazing richness of flavors.Dont miss the ancioves pasta and Zucca in agrodolce.I definitely planning to visit this place again.

In my opinion one of the best places to eat in Palermo.If you look for Excellent food and reasonable prices this is the place.Warm welcome and efficient staff.

Nice authentic place. Pleasant service. Excellent food. Pasta are all huge portions. Make a reservation otherwise you will find amongst the many who have to be turned away.

The food was good. The only issue was that the service was too fast because while we were still eating our antipasto they brought us our first plate. Moreover, since they don’t have the house wine, we ordered two glasses of white wine who’s prices were not listed on the menu (as required by lawand we got charged 4 euros each for a mediocre wine. Lastly, they sat us at the door which kept opening and closing while the restaurant was half empty.

‘Mangia bene, paga poco’ is how it was described to us. And they were right! This was as close to homestyle Italian cooking as we found in Palermo. The portions were massive - and in fact the pasta dishes are meant to be shared. The quality of the meal was top class, and they accommodated dishes per our dietary requests (no meat, no cheese). Grazie mille 🙏🏼

Very tasty food with huge dishes. You will be full from the first dish only, so be careful what you order. The pistachio is in most dishes and it is delicious. If you want to go for lunch or dinner, better make a reservation because it is quite packed.

There are much better places to eat in Palermo. The quality was not great but portion sizes are unnecessarily large. It would be better if they focused on the flavours. We felt terrible wasting food but it was impossible to finish and not enjoyable. It would be really helpful if they explained how much food would be served. I would recommend this place if youre travelling and have run out of money

Wow! Blown away by the exceptional value for money, service, and above all the best pasta (spada?!anyway, swordfish, I’ve ever eaten. A must visit in Palermo.

exactly as great as everyone says! Reservation is a must. The food is amazing and the portions are huge, especially for the cheap price. Service could be a bit better, but for that food to those prices it is not a big deal. We were very happy!

The best in town. It was hard to book a place. We had to book a place a week in advance, but it was worth waiting for. The food is really delicious and very cheap compared to other restaurants. The staff were friendly. We had great time and we wish to go again if we visit Palermo once again in the future.

Somewhat hidden, in a quite corner you find this Osteria and it is worth getting out of the busy and touristic parts. The price and quality is well balanced and they excelled our expectatin. The food was amazing, tasty and prepared with great care. The first dish, pasta is huge, with an antre and first course, you will be so full that no second or dessert. If you are two, share the pasta. The staff is exceptionally friendly and helpful but get a reservation or go there in time to have a table later. For us it was ready in an hour.

I had really gotten my hopes up to eat here, because when we got here a day earlier they were fully booked and you dont get fully booked if your food isnt good, right?Wrong - apparently.We started with the "crocché di latte"; little croquettes with a filling of besciamella and parmiggiano - but a hardly detectable amount of parmiggiano.Then I had "polpette di sarde" (sardine meatballs in tomato sauceand my partner the "trancio di spada alla griglia" (grilled swordfish).I had bones stuck in my throat for half an hour and the swordfish, although fresh, was wholly underwhelming. The "insalata pomodori e menta" (tomato and mint saladwas very nice, though.Yes, its cheap and yes they were fully booked, but I dont get why. We were also never asked if we liked the food, which is a bit of a prerequisite, IMO.If I go to Palermo again, I wont be going here (Ill go to Vucciria instead, located a 5 minute walk down the road).

Delicious authentic Sicilian food, enormous portions (especially pastaand really good prices. Why not 5 stars: as tourists, we felt that the locals (or Italian people in generalwere given more attention when it came to taking the order, being served, etc. Even though the staff otherwise seemed nice.

Its a very nice place with great food. Portions of the first course are enormous, it was almost impossible to finish it. Prices are very low especially for this quantity and quality of the meals.

After reading the reviews we were really excited to try this place, and it did not disappoint! Everything was delicious and served in such large portions. I had the spaghetti alla norma (5€and my partner had the pasta con le sarde, and both were so big we had to box them to take home and finish later.

very delicious dishes, huge portions of food, nice staff who packed us a second dish take-away because we were not able to eat it