You Can Eat The Original Fettuccine Alfredo At This Roman Restaurant

Buttery, cheesy fettuccine Alfredo has a reputation as a very American take on Italian cuisine, yet it turns out you can visit the birthplace of the dish right in the heart of Rome, a stone's throw from the Pantheon and the Trevi Fountain. The restaurant, Alfredo alla Scrofa, has been in business since 1914 — the name comes from chef Alfredo di Lelio, who created the now-famed dish, and the street on which it's located (Via Scrofa).

The creation of fettuccine Alfredo goes like this: Di Lelio's wife had recently given birth, and was having stomach troubles. So, the chef whipped up a dish of fettuccine with an emulsified butter and Parmigiano Reggiano sauce, the idea being that it would be an easy, plain food for her stomach to handle. The dish itself was an adaptation of fettuccine al burro, a dish of egg noodles, butter, and parmesan often served to sick people and kids, although Di Lelio beefed up the volume of butter, calling it fettuccine al triplo burro. It found its way onto the menu, and ended up popular in America after silent era film stars Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford tasted it and raved about it to famous friends back home.

If you visit the restaurant, don't expect a chainy, Olive Garden feel: The interior is upscale with wood paneling, tablecloths, and walls lined with old-school photos of Alfredo and famous guests. You'll pay a slightly elevated price of 24 euros ($26) for the pleasure, too.

Since its arrival in the States, fettuccine Alfredo has changed a lot: It's now common to find cooks upgrading their store-bought sauce with nutmeg and adding everything from chicken to shrimp or even steak mixed into the sauce, in ways that could seriously bother many Italians.  When it first arrived in the States, chefs also didn't know how to make the emulsification of butter and cheese, so cream found its way in, too, often thickened with flour.

So, all of this means that the fettuccine Alfredo you'll get at Alfredo alla Scrofa is likely a bit different to standard U.S. versions of it. It sticks to the historic butter and parmesan version of the dish, with primo varieties of those ingredients — per the restaurant, the butter is double cream (meaning extra-fatty) from the Alps, and the parmesan comes from a reputable cheesemaker. The fettuccine is made fresh with eggs, and you can also add truffles or caviar to the dish for an extra 25 or 40 euros, respectively.

Bear in mind that despite its Roman origins, fettuccine Alfredo is still very uncommon in Italy. There's one other notable Rome restaurant that serves it, though — Il Vero Alfredo. It also claims to be the home of the dish: After Di Lelio sold Alfredo alla Scrofa, he later opened this restaurant around 1950, and it has stayed in the family, but the Via Scrofa restaurant is where it was originally served.