Across Piazza Carignano in Turin, the brick facade of Palazzo Carignano ripples like a curtain in a breeze. The first Parliament of a unified Italy met behind those walls. Directly across the square sits Del Cambio, which opened its doors on October 5, 1757, and has been feeding the city ever since.
Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, the statesman who did more than anyone to stitch Italy together, was a regular here, seated with a view of the Parliament across the way. The Risorgimento room has been carefully restored and still carries its 19th-century bearing, and the original parquet creaks under every step.
The dish to order is the one that sounds strangest to an American ear. Vitello tonnato is cold, thinly sliced veal covered in a sauce made from tuna. On the current à la carte menu, chef Diego Giglio sends it out with chargrilled frisée and capers dressed in salsa verde. Book the 1757 tasting menu instead and it has been turning up in the Gran Antipasto Piemontese, a parade of small plates and cake stands, in two versions side by side: the old way, with a thick sauce made without mayonnaise, and the newer style most of Italy knows, smoothed out with it.
Tasting the two together is the whole history of the dish in two bites.
Vitello tonnato belongs to Piedmont, the mountainous northwest corner of Italy that also gave the world Barolo, white truffles and agnolotti. The cut is usually veal eye round from the back leg, braised or gently simmered, chilled overnight and sliced so thin you can nearly read through it. The sauce is tuna preserved in oil, anchovy and capers, blended into something silky, then spread over the meat until the veal all but disappears.
Meat and fish on the same plate is rare in the Italian kitchen, and that is what makes vitello tonnato so easy to underestimate. The veal is mild and tender. The sauce does the work, rich and salty with a briny snap from the capers. Served cold, it is summer food through and through, and around Milan it has long been a fixture of Ferragosto, the August 15 holiday that marks the height of the Italian summer.
The dish also crossed an ocean. Italian immigrants carried it to Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, where it kept its Piedmontese name, vitel tonnè, now usually spelled vitel toné. There it became a Christmas dish, which makes perfect sense when you remember December is the middle of summer in Buenos Aires.
In Dallas, vitello tonnato is still hard to find, which makes the places that serve it worth knowing.
The surest bet is Mamani, at 2681 Howell St. in The QUAD in Uptown. Chef Christophe De Lellis, who spent years running the kitchen at Joël Robuchon in Las Vegas, has had vitello tonnato on the menu since the restaurant opened in September 2025, finishing it with pickled mustard seeds and fried capers. Mamani earned a Michelin star less than two months after opening, and the vitello tonnato is a good place to start understanding why.
The one to watch is Sant Ambroeus, the Milanese institution coming to the Knox Street development. Its vitello tonnato, slow-roasted veal under a yellowfin tuna sauce with capers, is the signature that travels to every location, from Madison Avenue to Palm Beach. The Dallas opening date has not been announced, but when the doors open, this is the dish to order first.
And come December, it is worth asking at the Argentine kitchens around town whether vitel toné is on for the holidays. For a lot of families, Christmas does not feel right without it.
