Restaurant in Seggiano, Italy
Remote Michelin star, serious Tuscan cooking.
Silene holds a Michelin star (2024) in the unlikely setting of Pescina, a hamlet at the foot of Monte Amiata in Grosseto province. Chef-patron Roberto Rossi builds his tasting menus around a kitchen garden, house-pressed olive oil, and classic Tuscan technique. Hard to book and genuinely remote — worth the detour if you are already in the Maremma.
At the €€€ price point, Silene delivers one of the most coherent expressions of Tuscan ingredient-led cooking in southern Tuscany — and it holds a Michelin star (2024) to back that claim. If you are driving into the Maremma or looping around Monte Amiata and wondering whether a detour to Seggiano is worth restructuring your itinerary, the answer is yes, with conditions. Chef-patron Roberto Rossi runs a tight, focused operation from a small village that most visitors to Tuscany will never find. That combination of quality and genuine remoteness makes this a serious booking for the right traveller, not a casual lunch stop.
Silene operates out of a quiet, elegant room in Pescina, a hamlet attached to Seggiano at the foot of Monte Amiata. The atmosphere is composed and unhurried — this is not a restaurant that hums with ambient noise or fills up with passing trade. Expect a calm, almost intimate setting where conversation carries easily and the pace is set by the kitchen, not the clock. For a first visit, that tone can feel slightly formal if you arrive expecting the loose warmth of a trattoria, but it reads quickly as relaxed confidence rather than stiffness. Dress accordingly: smart-casual is the right register.
The kitchen's philosophy is rooted in classic Tuscan technique, applied to produce that is either grown in Rossi's own garden or sourced with clear provenance. When the garden is in season, dishes shift around what it is producing, so the menu you eat in spring will not be the menu you eat in autumn. That seasonal variability is part of the point. The chef's own extra-virgin olive oil, pressed from Seggiano olives, runs through the cooking as a consistent thread. Bread, reportedly a personal passion of Rossi's, arrives with the seriousness it deserves.
The progression of a meal at Silene follows the logic of a classic tasting structure: the kitchen moves from lighter, garden-driven preparations toward more substantial and technically demanding dishes, with fish appearing consistently across the menu despite the landlocked location. The pigeon ravioli, cited in Michelin's own documentation of the restaurant, is the kind of dish that justifies the star , precise pasta work, assertive filling, the kind of thing that tells you immediately that the kitchen has the technical range to match its ambition. For a first-timer, the tasting menu is the right choice over ordering à la carte, because the arc of the meal is where Rossi's cooking makes its argument most clearly. Ordering piecemeal risks losing that structure.
Fish dishes appear with enough regularity to surprise guests who assume a mountain-village restaurant in Tuscany will be entirely land-focused. That breadth is deliberate and reflects the Maremma's coastal proximity , Grosseto province runs from the Tyrrhenian coast up through the hills, and the kitchen uses that geography. If you have dietary restrictions that preclude fish, confirm when booking rather than on arrival.
Silene is hard to book. The restaurant is small, the village is remote, and the Michelin star means demand outstrips capacity with regularity. Dinner service runs Tuesday through Sunday, with seatings beginning at 7:15 PM and last entry at 8:30 PM. Lunch is available Friday, Saturday, and Sunday only, from 12 PM with last entry at 1:30 PM. Monday is closed. Book as far in advance as possible , several weeks minimum for dinner, and the same for weekend lunch. The restaurant has no website listed, which means your booking route will need to go through telephone or direct contact; confirm the current contact details before travelling. With no listed booking platform, assume the process requires more effort than an online reservation system would demand.
Getting here without a car is impractical. Seggiano sits inland in Grosseto province, and Pescina is a further remove from even the village centre. Driving from Grosseto takes roughly an hour; from Siena, expect around 90 minutes. Plan to stay nearby rather than attempting a late-evening drive back to a major city after dinner. For accommodation options in the area, see our full Seggiano hotels guide.
The Google rating sits at 4.6 from 210 reviews, which for a restaurant of this scale and ambition is a meaningful signal. That number reflects consistent execution rather than occasional brilliance , guests are not leaving disappointed at the rate that would pull a Michelin-starred venue below 4.5.
For the Seggiano and wider Maremma area, Silene sits alongside Caino in Montemerano as one of the two anchor fine-dining destinations in this part of Tuscany. Caino holds two Michelin stars and operates at a higher price tier; if you are choosing between the two, Silene is the better entry point and the more accessible booking. L'Asinello in Castelnuovo Berardenga offers another Tuscan fine-dining option further north, closer to Siena, if location is a deciding factor.
Within Italy's broader one-star Tuscan category, Silene's defining characteristic is its locational commitment. This is not a restaurant that has migrated to a city or repositioned for a tourist market. The cooking is tied to a specific geography in a way that is less common the closer you get to Florence or the main tourist routes. For more on what else the area offers, see our full Seggiano restaurants guide, along with guides to bars, wineries, and experiences in the region.
Book Silene if: you are already routing through the Maremma or Monte Amiata area, you want a Michelin-starred tasting experience that does not feel transplanted from an urban fine-dining circuit, and you have the flexibility to plan several weeks ahead. Do not book it as a day trip from Florence , the drive is too long and the experience deserves an overnight nearby. For comparable Italian fine dining worth comparing before you commit, Osteria Francescana in Modena, Piazza Duomo in Alba, and Uliassi in Senigallia each represent different points on the Italian fine-dining map if you are building an itinerary around restaurants rather than geography.
| Venue | Price | Booking Difficulty | Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Silene | €€€ | Hard | — |
| Atelier Moessmer Norbert Niederkofler | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Dal Pescatore | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Enoteca Pinchiorri | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Enrico Bartolini | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Le Calandre | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
A quick look at how Silene measures up.
The room at Silene is described as elegant but relaxed, so dress accordingly: neat, put-together clothing without being formal. A jacket for men would not be out of place at a Michelin-starred venue in rural Tuscany, but this is not a white-tablecloth formality situation. Avoid beachwear or very casual dress at the €€€ price point.
Silene is a small restaurant in a remote hamlet, and solo dining at Michelin-starred tasting venues in rural Italy can be awkward logistically — tables are typically set for two or more, and the drive to Seggiano from any major hub makes the effort harder to justify solo. If you are a serious cook or food traveller routing through Monte Amiata alone, it is worth calling ahead to confirm solo availability, but this venue suits pairs and small groups better.
Lunch is the more practical choice if you are driving in from outside the area — Silene serves Friday, Saturday, and Sunday lunch from 12 PM to 1:30 PM, which lets you time a meal around a broader Maremma itinerary. Dinner runs Tuesday through Sunday from 7:15 PM, but the village is isolated, so arriving after dark on unfamiliar roads adds friction. The kitchen and menu are the same; the decision is logistical.
At €€€ with a Michelin star behind it, Silene justifies the spend if you value ingredient-driven Tuscan cooking built around chef Roberto Rossi's own garden and estate-produced olive oil. The menu follows a classic tasting structure and the kitchen works with produce at peak season, so the value case is strongest between late spring and autumn. If you want à la carte flexibility rather than a full progression, this format may not suit you.
There is no documented bar seating or informal counter option at Silene. This is a small, formal-leaning restaurant in a rural hamlet, not a venue with a walk-in bar programme. Plan for a full sit-down experience and book ahead — walk-in capacity at a Michelin-starred restaurant of this size and remoteness is effectively zero.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
