Rome: Pizza & Gelato Cooking Class with Wine & Supplì

5.00

(181 reviews)

What’s the experience like?

The first thing I noticed was the flour—dusty fingerprints on the countertop, and the soft thump of dough as our chef, Marco, dropped it in front of us. The kitchen smelled like yeast and basil. There were six of us around the table, all a bit nervous (except Marco, who grinned like he’d seen this a hundred times). He showed us how to knead the dough with both hands—“like giving your nonna a shoulder massage,” he joked. My fingers stuck at first, but after a while it felt kind of meditative. I didn’t expect that part.

We tried out different toppings—Marco insisted on just three for “real” Neapolitan pizza, but let me sneak some mushrooms on mine anyway. While our pizzas baked (the oven was so hot you could feel it from across the room), we moved on to Roman supplì. Shaping those risotto balls was messier than I thought; my first one looked more like an egg than anything you’d see in Trastevere. Marco laughed and said “bravo!” anyway. The smell of frying oil mixed with tomato sauce hung in the air—reminded me of street food stalls near Termini station.

I was honestly most excited about the gelato part. Making it from scratch is weirdly satisfying—there’s this moment when it goes from liquid to creamy and everyone just stops talking for a second to watch. We tasted ours right away (mine had pistachio), still half-soft and cold enough to make my teeth hurt. There was unlimited Italian wine too—someone kept topping up my glass—and by then everyone was chatting like old friends. I still think about that view out the window: laundry lines between buildings, scooters zipping past below.