The most authentic way to experience Rome? This is it - The Times

“Say goodbye to personal space,” Chiara Nicolanti says as a trio of nonnas prod a student’s dough. Only a few minutes earlier they were prodding him, pinching his cheek affectionately and letting off a rapid-fire stream of instructions. 

For Nicolanti, 39, the founder of Pasta with Grandma, this is a social dynamic baked into what it means to be Italian. For the rest of the class it is an acquired taste — but one we are here to savour. 

We have gathered at a storied restaurant in the centre of Rome on a sweltering August evening to be guided by grandmothers, in this case Margherita Lucci, 69, Rosella Mercuri, 68, and Renzia Petrocchi, 67. 

Nonnamaxxing, in which Gen Z and millennial tourists seek out the wisdom of older women on holiday, is a viral travel trend for 2026. GetYourGuide, an online aggregator for tour experiences, claims searches for classes hosted by grandmas have increased by more than 250 per cent between 2023 and 2025 (it doesn’t share exact numbers). These include baking traditional Viennese pastries in Austria, dancing in Puglia and swotting up on local history in East Sussex.

The rise, it seems, is part of a quest for deep knowledge and authentic experiences on holiday. Learning from elders is an antidote to a digitised world, Johannes Reck, a cofounder of GetYourGuide, says. “Travellers are seeking moments to slow down, reconnect and engage with culture passed down through generations in a more human way,” he adds. “After all, what is more reassuring than the warmth of a grandmother?”

Our nonnas have 183 years of pasta-making knowledge between them. If there is anything about pasta they do not know it isn’t worth learning. All three have been kneading and stretching by hand since they were seven years old and their parents worked all day in the fields around Monte Gennaro. While the grown-ups picked cherries and olives, dinner responsibilities fell to the girls. 

Sixty years later, under the vaulted ceiling of the 100-year-old Il Collegio wine bar and restaurant on Piazza Capranica in the Colonna district, Nonna Marghe is demonstrating pasta dough preparation in the shadow of the Pantheon. She gently pats the honey-coloured ball as if it’s a newborn, before rolling it out, curling it around the pin then slapping it twice. “That is the sound of Sunday morning,” Nicolanti says. “When you know that nonna is home.” 

For Nicolanti this is personal. She grew up with her nonna, and when she became pregnant a decade ago she returned to her grandmother’s home in Palombara Sabina, a town 25 miles north of Rome. “I didn’t know what to expect, so I came back to my happy place,” she explains. “I realised I wasn’t alone and I understood that I am part of all the nonnas who came before me. 

“So I thought maybe some other girl around the world also needs to feel like that.” 

At first Pasta with Grandma was just Nicolanti and her nonna, Nerina, teaching students the art of Italian cuisine. Then other older women from Palombara Sabina were brought in. Through her business, which hosts workshops through GetYourGuide, Nicolanti discovered new dimensions to her grandmother. 

“Someone asked my nonna a question and I ended up learning all these new things about her,” she says. Although Nonna Nerina died three years ago, “I can’t say I miss her because I feel her so strongly every day,” Nicolanti says. “When we make pasta we are trying to recreate Sunday morning, the only day when a daughter woke up and her mum and grandma were cooking together and sharing stories.

“Cooking for family gave women value, as did looking after loved ones. It was a peasant meal, just flour and eggs using hands, tools and knowledge. Usually grandmas teach granddaughters. It’s our love language.”

That may be true, but our class is strictly about fun.

As the students file into position around the prep station the nonnas dance, burst into spontaneous song and undo Nicolanti’s apron when she’s not looking. 

Our names are assigned: all the male students are called Johnny so that the nonnas will remember, and the rest of us are known as bella de nonna — grandma’s darling. Our instructors seem more like VIP entertainment than employees. 

The only serious business is pasta. Today we will make two kinds — fettuccine and ravioli. As a novice I’m amazed to learn we’ll use only two ingredients, an egg and 100g flour per person. Fettuccine relies on durum wheat semolina, while double-zero flour gives the ravioli the fine, silky quality it needs. Nonna Rosella shows us how to mix the egg into a volcano of flour, bringing in a little of the latter at a time in until it is all combined. We knead, and Nicolanti tells us the nonnas are learning English on Duolingo. 

Although they seem disappointed that this Italian-named writer does not speak their language, a translator is on hand. This also helps to bridge the gaps between students, who today hail from Italy, the US, the UK and Brazil. 

After Nonna Rosella rolls the dough around her pin she slaps it twice, pushes it out quickly and a crescent shape is imprinted. The steps are repeated, the dough directed to a different side of the board until it is stretched equally all the way around. The bigger it gets, the harder it becomes, the nonnas chuckle, until eventually the dough is a huge moon, translucent like the sail of a boat. Into the ravioli goes the filling: ricotta, spinach, parmigiano and lemon zest.

We don’t yet have the skill needed to stretch our pastas by hand so a machine is produced. The handpowered device revolutionised the craft when it arrived in 1960, although our experts say it produces slightly tougher pasta. Their energy is infectious, and I am not afraid to make mistakes. The only time I fear I may be too Scottish for their theatrics is when a rowdy rendition of Jump in the Line (Shake, Senora) goes up, the final word replaced by “your pasta”. 

Among the students are devout evangelists. Mel, from Florida, came to Il Collegio nine years ago to eat handmade pasta for the first time. “I can’t eat pasta from the store any more,” she says. “Even when I make it myself it’s not the same. It has set the bar high.” 

Later, Il Collegio’s chefs get to work with the fruit of our labour. As our cooked fettuccine appears from the kitchen it is anointed with sugo and passed down the communal table. 

The nonnas have opinions — more seasoning is needed; their own tomato and basil sauce is simmered for at least an hour — but there are no complaints from the students. When the ravioli is delivered a round of applause goes up when we learn not a single pasta pillow has burst. 

As we eat, the nonnas reflect on their lives. They grew up together on the same street in Palombara Sabina, and when Nonna Marghe began cooking she was so small she couldn’t see over the dinner table. Now they come to Il Collegio to be children. “Everyone thinks we should stay at home but this is how we fight back. This is our revenge,” Nonna Rosella says with a smile. 

It is also a chance to expand their horizons. “People come from different religions and cultures, and we all come together here,” Nonna Renzia says. “I spent my life working in a field and now I can meet the rest of the world.

“We have many young people who hug us and tell us they feel like we are their nonnas. I feel like I am giving back to their nonna with my love. Students who have never met before swap numbers.” 

This bears out in the boom in nonnas sharing their knowledge around the world. In Japan you can “rent” a granny for an hourly sum — an obaasan will teach you how to do chores, cook a hearty dinner or write a beautiful letter. 

It’s something I ponder the next day when I explore the National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art, tucked behind the sprawling Villa Borghese park (£14; gnamc.cultura.gov.it). If I were here with a wise elder, how much more might I understand about how new and old Rome collide? 

When I meander back to my digs, the four-star 9Hotel Cesari, sandwiched between the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon, I head up to one of the most breathtaking rooftop bars in the city for a sunset spritz. A tableau of rosy pantiles and porticos unfurls in front of me, and I only wish I had someone nonna-shaped to decode it.

For tonight, as if to prove Nonna Renzia’s point, a group of us end up going for a drink after class. At midnight the Italians give us a guided tour of Rome’s plazas, illuminated in horizontal and vertical layers like a candelabra. Looking up, we glimpse carved wooden ceilings through the open windows of top-floor apartments, witness to history usually hidden from view. It’s a familiar feeling: learning from nonna is not one evening’s endeavour but the act of stepping into a life. Gabriella Bennett was a guest of GetYourGuide, which has a two-and-a-half-hour pasta class from £85pp, including dinner and wine (getyourguide.com). Room-only doubles at 9Hotel Cesari Rome from £144 (9-hotel-cesari-rome.it). Fly to Rome