Restaurant in Moretta, Italy
Frescoed villa dining at mid-range prices.
A restored mid-1800s Piedmontese villa with consecutive Michelin Plate recognition (2024, 2025) and a 4.2 Google rating from over 700 reviews. At €€, it offers a rare multi-format menu — Piedmontese à la carte, a business lunch option, and evening pizzas — in a setting of frescoed ceilings and a municipal garden. Easy to book; strongest in summer for the veranda.
Picture a mid-1800s Piedmontese villa, its ceilings painted in frescoes, its garden immaculate, its name carrying the memory of Edoardo Salina — the chef who once cooked for the House of Savoy. That heritage could easily become a museum piece. At Villa Salina, it is instead working furniture: a backdrop for a chef-owner who trained in a family pasticceria and has since rebuilt both the building and his cooking around it. The verdict, anchored by consecutive Michelin Plate recognitions in 2024 and 2025 and a Google rating of 4.2 across 706 reviews, is clear: this is a credible, mid-priced Piedmontese table that earns its place on a considered itinerary of the Cuneo province.
Villa Salina runs a format that is rare in this category: a genuinely multi-mode menu. At lunch there is a regionally inspired à la carte alongside a business menu, which keeps the midday visit accessible in both pace and price. In the evening, the kitchen expands into a selection of high-quality pizzas alongside the broader menu. In summer, the dining room opens onto a veranda and the adjoining garden — maintained by the local municipality , becomes part of the experience. This is a restaurant with real structural range, which is worth understanding before you book: the lunch visit and the dinner visit are meaningfully different propositions.
If you have been once , most likely for a weekday lunch or a summer terrace dinner , here is how to build the return visits. The three-visit arc at Villa Salina is one of the more coherent in the Cuneo belt.
Visit one (if you have not been yet): Arrive at lunch and use the à la carte to read the kitchen's Piedmontese anchors. The region's larder , tajarin, vitello tonnato, the braised cuts of Fassona cattle , gives any serious cook plenty to work with. The business menu is an efficient entry point if you want a shorter commitment, but the à la carte will show you more of what the chef-owner's pastry background brings to the savory side of the plate.
Visit two: Return in the evening. The pizza program is not an afterthought or a crowd-pleaser bolt-on; in a restaurant rooted in a pasticceria tradition, dough and fermentation are within the chef's genuine competence. An evening visit also gives you the fuller dining room atmosphere and, in the warmer months, access to the veranda in a different light and mood than lunch provides.
Visit three: Come in summer specifically to use the garden. The municipality-owned garden adjacent to the villa is the kind of setting that changes the register of a meal entirely. Book a table on the veranda and allow time before or after to walk the grounds. This is also the visit where Villa Salina starts to feel less like a restaurant and more like a place , which is the strongest argument for returning a third time rather than spending the same money elsewhere.
For context within the broader Piedmont dining circuit, Villa Salina sits in a different tier to the region's high-commitment tables. Piazza Duomo in Alba and Antica Corona Reale in Cervere both require more planning, more spend, and a clearer appetite for a formal tasting experience. Villa Salina is the table you build into a Piedmont trip as a reliable, lower-stakes meal that still has genuine culinary intention behind it. It is also worth comparing to Locanda Sant'Uffizio Enrico Bartolini in Cioccaro if you are planning a multi-day stay in the province; that property offers a hotel-restaurant combination Villa Salina cannot match, but at a price point several steps above the €€ positioning here.
The frescoed ceilings and the villa's 19th-century bones are not simply atmosphere , they are a reason to choose this specific restaurant over a more functionally competent trattoria in Moretta or the surrounding comuni. The restoration has been done by the owner-chef, which means the building and the cooking share an authorial point of view. That coherence is harder to find than the Michelin Plate credential might suggest. For a fuller picture of dining in the area, see our full Moretta restaurants guide. If you are building a longer stay around the villa and the region, our Moretta hotels guide, bars guide, and wineries guide are useful complements, along with our Moretta experiences guide.
Price: €€ , mid-range by Italian standards, accessible relative to the Michelin Plate recognition. Booking: Easy; phone and walk-in likely viable, though the summer terrace and weekend evenings will fill. Book a few days ahead to secure outdoor seating in season. Dress: No confirmed dress code, but the villa setting rewards smart-casual over casual. Leading timing: Summer lunch or dinner for the veranda and garden; any season for the indoor frescoed rooms. Group size: The villa format suits couples and small groups comfortably; larger parties should contact ahead to confirm capacity.
Against the national field of Italian fine dining, Villa Salina sits well below the price and formality of venues like Osteria Francescana in Modena, Dal Pescatore in Runate, or Atelier Moessmer Norbert Niederkofler in Brunico , all of which operate at €€€€ and require significantly more advance planning. For a broader view of where Italy's leading tables sit, see also Uliassi in Senigallia, Enoteca Pinchiorri in Florence, Le Calandre in Rubano, Enrico Bartolini in Milan, Casa Perbellini 12 Apostoli in Verona, Reale in Castel di Sangro, and Quattro Passi in Marina del Cantone. Villa Salina's value case is not that it competes with those rooms , it is that it offers a coherent, historically grounded Piedmontese meal at a price that lets you return twice more on the same budget.
Villa Salina's confirmed format is à la carte at lunch alongside a business menu option, with pizzas added in the evening. There is no confirmed tasting menu in the available data. For a dedicated tasting menu experience in Piedmont, Piazza Duomo in Alba is the stronger choice, though at a significantly higher price point.
The restaurant operates across multiple formats , à la carte, a business lunch menu, and evening pizzas , so your first visit is leading shaped by time of day. Come at lunch for the most focused Piedmontese cooking. The setting, a restored mid-1800s villa with frescoed ceilings, does real work on the experience, so give yourself time to take it in rather than treating it as a quick stop.
Booking is easy relative to the broader Italian fine dining circuit. A few days' notice should be sufficient for most visits. Exception: if you want the summer veranda or garden seating, book at least a week out to secure the outdoor tables, which are the strongest reason to visit in the warmer months.
At €€, yes , this is one of the more coherent value cases in the Cuneo province. Two consecutive Michelin Plate recognitions (2024 and 2025) and a 4.2 Google rating across 706 reviews confirm that the kitchen is consistent. You are getting a historically significant setting and a chef with genuine investment in the building and the region, at a price well below comparable Piedmontese tables.
No dress code is confirmed, but the villa's frescoed rooms and restored interiors set a tone. Smart-casual is the practical call: a step above what you would wear to a neighbourhood trattoria, but nowhere near the formality required at a starred restaurant. In summer on the veranda, relaxed smart works well.
Within the Cuneo province, Antica Corona Reale in Cervere is the most direct regional comparison for serious Piedmontese cooking, though it operates at a higher price point and formality level. Locanda Sant'Uffizio Enrico Bartolini in Cioccaro adds a hotel option if you are planning an overnight stay. For the full picture of what is available locally, see our Moretta restaurants guide.
Yes, with a specific caveat: the setting , frescoed ceilings, a restored 19th-century villa, a garden , does more work for a special occasion than the cooking alone would. Book a summer evening for the veranda if the occasion warrants it. At €€, it is also a rare case where a genuinely atmospheric special-occasion meal does not require a significant financial commitment.
The à la carte format and the accessible price point make it a workable solo option, particularly at lunch. The business menu is a practical choice if you want a contained, time-efficient meal. The frescoed dining room can feel formal for a solo visit in the evening, but the veranda in summer is more relaxed. Worth considering if you are passing through the Cuneo area solo and want a meal with genuine local character.
| Venue | Cuisine | Price | Booking Difficulty |
|---|---|---|---|
| Villa Salina | Piedmontese | €€ | Easy |
| Atelier Moessmer Norbert Niederkofler | Italian, Creative | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Dal Pescatore | Italian, Italian Contemporary | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Osteria Francescana | Progressive Italian, Creative | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Quattro Passi | Italian, Mediterranean Cuisine | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Reale | Progressive Italian, Modern Cuisine | €€€€ | Unknown |
Comparing your options in Moretta for this tier.
Villa Salina does not run a fixed tasting menu in the traditional sense. The format is à la carte at lunch, with regionally inspired Piedmontese dishes and a business menu option, while evenings add high-quality pizzas to the selection. At €€ pricing with Michelin Plate recognition for both 2024 and 2025, the à la carte is the format to commit to — it gives you more control over spend without sacrificing the kitchen's ambition.
The building itself is part of the reason to come: a restored mid-1800s villa named after Edoardo Salina, chef to the House of Savoy, with frescoed ceilings and a garden maintained by the local municipality. The chef started in a family pasticceria and now runs a genuinely multi-format menu, so expect Piedmontese à la carte at lunch and pizzas added in the evening. It holds a Michelin Plate — recognition of solid cooking, not starred-level formality — so arrive expecting good food in a distinctive setting, not a ceremony.
At €€ pricing in a small Piedmontese town like Moretta, Villa Salina is unlikely to require weeks of advance booking for a standard lunch. For summer terrace dining or weekend evenings, booking a few days ahead is a sensible precaution given the limited seating in a villa setting. Phone booking is the most direct route, though no contact details are currently listed publicly — check the venue directly via local directories.
Yes, for what it is. Two consecutive Michelin Plates (2024 and 2025) at €€ pricing is a strong value ratio by any measure in Italian dining. The building adds something that a standard trattoria at the same price point cannot: genuine 19th-century architecture, frescoed ceilings, and a summer veranda. If you are comparing it to starred restaurants in Piedmont, it costs less and carries less ceremony, which is the point.
The venue holds a Michelin Plate, not a star, and its format spans business lunches to evening pizza — which signals a relaxed rather than formal dress expectation. Smart casual is a reasonable baseline: no need for a jacket, but the villa setting means very casual attire would feel out of place. For a summer terrace dinner, dress as you would for a good Italian restaurant rather than a special-occasion dining room.
Moretta is a small town in Cuneo province, and comparable dining options at a similar level within the immediate area are limited. For Piedmontese cooking at higher ambition and price, Dal Pescatore in Canneto sull'Oglio or venues in the Langhe wine zone are the natural step up. Within the €€ bracket and Michelin recognition tier, Villa Salina is the reference point in its locality rather than one option among several.
Yes, with the right expectations. The frescoed villa, restored 19th-century setting, and summer veranda make it a more memorable backdrop than most restaurants at this price level. It suits a birthday, anniversary, or celebratory lunch where atmosphere matters as much as the menu. If you need a full tasting menu experience with wine pairings and long-form service, look at starred venues in Piedmont instead.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
