Restaurant in San Teodoro, Italy
Resort setting, real Michelin kitchen. Book it.
Gusto by Sadler is Sardinia's most credible resort fine-dining option — a Michelin one-star restaurant inside the Baglioni Resort north of San Teodoro, where Claudio Sadler's Mediterranean programme spans classic shellfish and lobster dishes through to technically precise modern plates. At €€€€ with a garden and pool setting, it earns its price. Book at least three to four weeks out in peak summer.
Gusto by Sadler is easy to misread as a hotel restaurant that trades on a famous name and a pretty poolside setting. That misreading will cost you a booking. This is a Michelin one-star operation inside the Baglioni Resort north of San Teodoro, with a Mediterranean menu that holds its own on culinary merit — not just on ambiance. If you are already staying at the resort, booking here is direct. If you are driving in from San Teodoro or elsewhere in Gallura, it is still worth the trip, provided you plan far enough ahead.
The room looks out over a garden and swimming pool, and the visual context matters more than it might elsewhere. This is not a restaurant that fights its holiday surroundings — it leans into them deliberately. Dining here at dusk, when the pool light shifts and the garden dims, gives meals a particular unhurried quality that is hard to replicate in a city dining room. That atmosphere is part of what you are paying for at the €€€€ price point, and it is not filler. For food-focused travellers who want both serious cooking and a setting that actually feels like Sardinia, this combination is rarer than it should be.
The restaurant is open every evening from 7 PM to 11 PM, seven days a week, which makes it more accessible than many comparable starred restaurants in Italy that close two or three nights. That said, its position within a resort means tables are contested by hotel guests and outside diners simultaneously. Book hard in advance , peak summer on the Costa Smeralda is unforgiving, and a Michelin star in a resort context means availability tightens faster than the Google rating of 4.3 from 43 reviews might suggest.
Claudio Sadler's name gives the kitchen a clear culinary lineage , his Milan restaurant carried two Michelin stars for years, and his Mediterranean register is well documented. Resident chef Andrea Besana executes that programme on the ground in Sardinia. The menu moves between direct Sardinian-Mediterranean signatures (lobster salad with sweet and sour vegetables, yellow cherry tomato gazpacho, sautéed shellfish) and more technically precise modern plates (rosehip and raspberry jelly dessert with rhubarb, basil gel and fior di latte ice cream). The vegetarian tasting menu is a deliberate structural choice, not an afterthought , worth knowing if that is a priority for your group.
The menu architecture suggests a kitchen that is comfortable serving both guests who want recognisable coastal Italian cooking and those who want something with more technique and intention. That range is an asset for mixed groups but also means the experience you get depends significantly on what you order. If you are here for the star-level cooking, lean toward the modern options and consider the tasting menu format rather than ordering à la carte from the classical side alone.
The editorial angle worth addressing directly: at a €€€€ resort restaurant in Sardinia, the drinks list is a meaningful part of the overall bill. Sardinian wines , particularly Vermentino di Gallura, grown on granite soils less than an hour from this table , are the logical pairing anchor here, and any credible list at this level should lead with them. Cannonau from the Nuoro interior and structured whites from producers like Capichera or Piero Mancini represent the regional context that would make sense alongside a menu built around local seafood and Mediterranean produce. We do not have the specific list on file, but at Michelin one-star level the expectation is a list with genuine depth in Italian producers and competent sommelier support. If wine is central to why you are booking, ask for the wine list before confirming , the resort context occasionally means a list weighted toward international names over regional ones, which at this location would be a missed opportunity.
Same applies to aperitivo and digestivo options. Sardinian Mirto and local amaro producers give a bar programme a clear identity at this price point. Whether the kitchen bar here uses them purposefully is worth asking when you book.
Gusto by Sadler is one of a small number of Michelin-starred restaurants operating in Sardinia's resort season, which runs roughly June through September. Book at least three to four weeks out during peak summer, and earlier if your dates fall around Ferragosto (mid-August), when the entire northeastern coast fills. The restaurant's location within the Baglioni Resort on Via Tavolara, north of San Teodoro, means access by car is the practical approach , no public transit serves the area at dinner hour. Valet or resort parking handles arrival logistics.
Phone and website details are not currently listed in our database; contact the Baglioni Resort directly to reach the restaurant's reservations line. Dress code is not confirmed in our records, but a €€€€ Michelin-starred resort restaurant in this part of Italy runs smart-casual as the floor, with guests typically dressing for dinner in a way that reflects the occasion. Shorts and beachwear are not appropriate.
For the full picture of what to eat and drink in San Teodoro and the surrounding Gallura region, see our full San Teodoro restaurants guide, our full San Teodoro bars guide, our full San Teodoro wineries guide, our full San Teodoro hotels guide, and our full San Teodoro experiences guide. For context on how Gusto by Sadler sits within the broader Italian fine dining scene, comparisons with Uliassi in Senigallia and Quattro Passi in Marina del Cantone are instructive , both are starred coastal Italian restaurants that face the same tension between resort-adjacent settings and serious cooking.
| Venue | Cuisine | Price | Booking Difficulty |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gusto by Sadler | Modern Cuisine | €€€€ | Hard |
| Atelier Moessmer Norbert Niederkofler | Italian, Creative | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Dal Pescatore | Italian, Italian Contemporary | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Enoteca Pinchiorri | Italian - French, Italian Contemporary | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Enrico Bartolini | Creative | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Le Calandre | Progressive Italian, Creative | €€€€ | Unknown |
What to weigh when choosing between Gusto by Sadler and alternatives.
The menu divides between classical Mediterranean dishes and more experimental modern plates, so lean into both to get the full picture of what Sadler and resident chef Andrea Besana are doing here. The lobster salad with sweet and sour vegetables and the yellow cherry tomato gazpacho represent the classical side well. If you have room for dessert, the rosehip and raspberry jelly with rhubarb, basil gel, and fior di latte ice cream is the kind of dish that justifies the Michelin star on its own. The vegetarian tasting menu is worth considering even if you're not vegetarian — it tends to show the kitchen's technical range more clearly than the à la carte.
Gusto by Sadler is one of the very few Michelin-starred options in the entire Gallura region, so direct competition is thin on the ground. For comparable cooking in a non-resort context, you'd need to travel further into Sardinia or to mainland Italy. Within San Teodoro, most alternatives are casual seafood trattorias that operate at a significantly lower price point but without the tasting menu format or the culinary pedigree Sadler's name brings. If the €€€€ pricing is the barrier, those trattorias are the practical alternative — not a like-for-like swap.
Yes — this is one of the stronger cases for a special-occasion dinner in northern Sardinia. The Michelin star (2024), the garden and pool setting, and the tasting menu format all work in favour of a celebratory dinner. The resort context adds a sense of occasion without requiring you to be a guest at Baglioni Resort. For a couple or small group wanting a proper dinner that marks an evening rather than just filling one, this is the right call in this part of Sardinia.
Gusto by Sadler sits inside the Baglioni Resort, a property at the top of the Sardinian resort tier, and holds a Michelin star — so dress accordingly. Resort smart is the floor: think pressed linen trousers or a dress rather than shorts and sandals. You do not need a jacket and tie, but arriving underdressed at a €€€€ Michelin-starred hotel restaurant in Sardinia will feel conspicuous. The outdoor poolside setting keeps things from being stiff, but the price point and the setting both signal that effort is expected.
For most diners visiting specifically for the cooking, yes. The tasting menu is where the kitchen's structure — classical dishes alternating with more modern preparations — is most coherent. The vegetarian tasting menu in particular is worth noting: it exists as a fully considered option, not an afterthought. If you're at Baglioni Resort for a week and debating whether one tasting menu dinner is worth the premium over the à la carte, the answer is yes — it's the most direct way to get the Sadler-Besana collaboration in full.
Book at least 2 to 3 weeks ahead, and further out if you're visiting in July or August when Sardinia's peak resort season compresses demand across a small number of quality restaurants. Gusto by Sadler is open every evening from 7 PM, but it operates within a resort, which means table inventory is not large and in-house guests have easy access. Don't leave this to arrival-day booking if a specific evening matters to you.
At €€€€ pricing, Gusto by Sadler is positioned at the top of the Sardinian dining market, and the Michelin star (2024) alongside Claudio Sadler's two-starred Milan pedigree gives that pricing a credible basis. The value case holds if you're already in San Teodoro and want one serious dinner rather than several mid-range ones. Where it gets harder to justify is if you're travelling purely for the food — at this price level, mainland Italy offers more density of comparable restaurants. As a destination dinner within a Sardinia holiday, it earns its price.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
