Mylord Civitavecchia, the Pre-Cruise Family Dinner We Booked on Nothing but Our Host’s Word

Updated August 2026. We paid for this meal ourselves, minus two drink coupons from our Airbnb host, and Mylord had no idea who we were.

There is exactly one dinner between you and your cruise. You flew in that afternoon, the ship sails out of Civitavecchia in the morning, everyone is tired, and nobody wants to spend the evening scrolling reviews. That was us, standing in an Airbnb wondering where to eat in Civitavecchia the night before a cruise, when our host messaged us a recommendation for a place called Mylord and threw in coupons for free drinks. So we did something we almost never do. We skipped the research entirely and just went.

I want to be clear about how low my expectations were. On our last Italy trip, our first meal in Rome was the one dinner none of us enjoyed, and it earned a spot in the bottom three of our Italy meals roundup. So walking up to Mylord, a ristorante and lounge bar tucked between two little lanes right off the main road, I figured worst case we get a story. Instead, we got one of the pleasant surprises of the trip. Dinner for the four of us came to 93 euro, and it was good enough that we would go back.

Here is the whole dinner in about forty seconds, from the walk up to the last bite.

The Recommendation We Didn’t Research

The deciding factor here was simple. We didn’t have to do any research, and the host sweetened it with free drink coupons. Vika did go online for a quick sanity check, and truthfully she looked more at the photos of the food than at the reviews. The 4.3 stars were enough to get us to try it, especially since we had nothing else lined up.

From where we stayed it was about a ten minute walk. If you didn’t know it was there you could walk right past it, but it isn’t hard to find, and once you turn off the main road the setting sells itself. Umbrellas, flower walls, honeycomb serving carts, cobblestones. Very Italy.

The Room Sells You Before the Menu Does

Inside, the place surprised me. The room is modern and cute without trying too hard, and it gives off an Italy vibe rather than a theme park version of one. There are a couple of different rooms. One has a proper bar. Another has an entire wall of wine bottles and works as a wine bar. And near the entrance they keep a glass cabinet where they dry age whole fish, which looked pretty cool and told me somebody in that kitchen takes the seafood seriously.

An English Menu, and Why That Made Me Nervous

Not everything worked smoothly. The Wi-Fi signal was awful, and the QR code digital menu they pointed us to first didn’t load the way anyone wanted it to. They brought out paper menus instead, and the paper menus were in English.

After years of watching travel videos and doing my own research, my rule of thumb has been that a place with an English menu is usually a tourist trap. So I sat there slightly worried about what the food was going to be. I will spoil it now. The rule did not hold up at Mylord.

Free Drinks First, and an Honest Word About Spritzes

The coupons covered our drinks, which is a nice way to start any meal. I got a beer, and the beer was great. Cold, tasty, and pretty to look at. That is the thing I like about beer. You can’t really go wrong. A beer tastes like a beer, and they are consistent in a way cocktails are not.

Vika got an Aperol spritz. It was sweet, but refreshing, and the ice cooled it down enough that the sweetness didn’t overpower. We drank a lot of spritzes on our last Italy trip, from one in Pisa that was watered down with way too much sparkling water (that story is in our Pisa day trip review) to the overly sweet ones sold in plastic cups through walk-up windows. This one was better than those, maybe a little better than average overall, but nothing earth shattering. Perfectly enjoyable, not memorable.

Carpaccio Piemontese, the Quiet Standout

We ordered from all over the menu, and the dish nobody expected to win the night was the Carpaccio Piemontese, 17 euro from the cold appetizers. Thin slices of Piedmontese beef with arugula, Pachino cherry tomatoes, truffle mayonnaise, shaved Grana that tasted freshly cut, and a crunchy topping we could not identify at the table. We guessed some kind of breaded nut, maybe pistachio. The menu later solved the mystery. It was crumbled Neapolitan tarallo, basically a crushed Italian cracker.

The meat was very flavorful, and I tried a piece with and without the truffle mayo. With it is the move. Vika called this the standout dish of the night, and I would say she is right. Rich, generous portion, zero complaints. The tarallo crunch split the table, I liked it, she felt it wasn’t necessary, but that is the only note either of us had.

Gran Grigliata di Mare, Order It for the Fish, Not the Shells

The Gran Grigliata di Mare is listed as an appetizer at 30 euro, but it is large enough to be an entree if one person kept it to themselves. Ours had scampi, big king prawns, a white fish fillet, and grilled squid, and the day’s catch sits on ice right by the door, so you can see what you are getting into before you order.

Here is the honest read. The prawns were tasty in typical prawn fashion, which means that by the time you are done taking off the head and the shell, there isn’t a lot of meat waiting for you. The scampi were the same story but with more work. I tried opening a claw and there was barely anything in it, and while the body had some tasty meat, I wouldn’t order a plate of just those. The fish, though, was excellent. Great texture, tasted perfectly done, even better with a squeeze of lemon. And the squid was the sleeper hit. There wasn’t a large amount of it, but taste wise it was great, and it is the thing I would absolutely order again.

The Carbonara We Did Not Need (and Kept Eating Anyway)

The carbonara, 17 euro, was a last minute addition. We were already full from the appetizers and it was entirely unnecessary, and we ate it anyway, because it showed up at the table in its own little copper pan and it smelled like a decision we were not going to regret.

I don’t typically like al dente pasta. The first restaurant on our last Italy trip served a pasta so stiff it tasted like it met boiling water for two or three minutes and gave up. This was the opposite. It still had texture, but it was flavorful and tasted done. For me, this was the perfect al dente. The sauce was rich and did its job, and the bacon on top was fantastic, salty and crisp and easily the best part of the dish. Josh tried the pasta and the bacon and liked both. Emily was not a huge fan, but I have seen her make worse faces at food. I would call her review one thumb sideways, which for Emily is not a loss.

Feeding Two Kids for 16 Euro

There is no dedicated kids menu at Mylord, and our waitress, nice as she was, didn’t go out of her way to help us hunt for kid friendly options. Part of that was a language barrier. She didn’t really speak English, but pointing at the menu got the job done. After much review, Vika assembled what I would call the kitty version of a meal. The two kids shared the pollo crock ai 5 cereali, cereal crusted chicken strips for 10 euro, and a plate of patatine fritte for 6 euro. The fries came out separate from the chicken, and between the two plates it was plenty of food for two kids, one of whom has a rather adult size appetite and one of whom is incredibly picky. For 16 euro combined, that is a huge win.

I tasted the chicken, and it tasted like schnitzel. When we order something like this in the States it usually tastes like an overly processed chicken nugget that exists to be dipped in ketchup. Not here. You could tell it was made in house. The breading had actual seasoning, the right amount of salt, some pepper, and you didn’t need ketchup to enjoy it. The fries were typical fries, nothing special, which is exactly what the kids wanted them to be. Both kids left happy, and Josh also worked his way through the grilled fish and the carpaccio and was pleased with all of it.

How Much Does Dinner in Civitavecchia Cost for a Family?

Our dinner for four at Mylord came to 93 euro total. Nobody publishes real numbers for Civitavecchia restaurants, so here is our entire receipt: carbonara 17, Gran Grigliata di Mare 30, Carpaccio Piemontese 17, the kids’ chicken 10 and fries 6, a bottle of water 3, and the servizio cover charge of 2.50 per person, 10 euro for the four of us. Our beer and Aperol spritz were free with the coupons from our Airbnb host, so budget a few euro more if you are paying for drinks.

How Far Is Mylord From the Civitavecchia Cruise Port?

Mylord sits in the old center on Via Luigi Cadorna, just off the main road and a couple of blocks from the waterfront, which puts it an easy walk from most Civitavecchia restaurants near the cruise port. From our Airbnb near the center it was about ten minutes on foot. If you are walking from the cruise terminals themselves, plan on more like fifteen to twenty minutes or a quick cab. After dinner we strolled down to the water and walked off the carbonara, which I recommend building into the plan.

Is Mylord Good for Kids?

Yes, with a caveat. There is no kids menu, and the staff won’t necessarily guide you to the right order. But the menu is vast, the portions are very large, and dinner in Civitavecchia with kids is easier here than the lack of a kids menu suggests. If your kid isn’t picky they will definitely find something. If they are picky, chicken strips and fries that taste like real food will still send them away happy.

Do You Need a Reservation at Mylord?

Mylord isn’t on OpenTable or TheFork, so you can’t book through the usual apps. Reservations go through the restaurant directly by phone or WhatsApp, and the listing you will see on the map is Mylord Ristorante Il Bivio. We walked in early in the evening without a reservation and had our pick of tables, though I would expect a livelier room later at night, since the lounge bar side of the operation stays open late.

The Verdict, Would We Eat Here Again?

Here is the thing about Italy. Even in a small port city like Civitavecchia, there is a ton of food options, and part of me always wants to try the next place. So under the right circumstances I would probably explore other spots first. But some places you eat at once and know you are done, and this is not one of them. This is a place I would go to again, and it earns a real recommendation, especially if you are staying over before a sailing and want one good dinner without spending your evening on research. The room is clean and inviting, the staff was nice enough, the carpaccio and the fish are worth the walk, and the kids ate for 16 euro.

The next morning we boarded Legend of the Seas for our Mediterranean sailing, full family, no regrets, and nobody hungry. If you are planning the cruise side of a trip like this, our Symphony of the Seas family review shows what a week on a Royal Caribbean ship actually looks like with kids, and our guide to getting around Italy as a family covers the logistics of getting to port towns like this one. And if you want proof that trusting a good tip beats trusting a crowd, compare this dinner to the truffle dinner at Ristorante Ad Hoc in Rome, the other time an Italy meal outran our expectations.