Pizzeria da Felice, Lucca

Pizzeria da Felice is a much-loved Lucca institution on Via Buia in the historic centre of the walled Tuscan city, serving the local street-food classics since 1942. It is a no-frills, mostly stand-up operation rather than a sit-down restaurant, and locals queue here at lunchtime for cecina, the thin baked flatbread made from chickpea flour that is a speciality of Lucca and the wider Tuscan coast, along with slices of pizza, focaccia and the local schiacciata. The cecina, golden and slightly crisp at the edges, is the signature item, often eaten folded in a piece of bread or simply on its own with a dusting of black pepper, and it pairs traditionally with a glass of chilled local wine. The pizza is sold by the slice, baked in trays and cut to order, and the focaccia and other baked snacks make for a cheap and satisfying quick meal. The atmosphere is fast, busy and authentic, with customers eating standing up or taking their food away to enjoy elsewhere in the city, and the prices are remarkably low, making it one of the best-value bites in Lucca. It is precisely this combination of long history, simple specialities and rock-bottom prices that has kept Felice popular across generations of Lucchesi and made it a must-visit for travellers wanting genuine local street food rather than a tourist menu. The pizzeria keeps split hours, typically open for a lunchtime stretch and again in the late afternoon and early evening, Monday to Saturday, and closes between services, so timing a visit matters. No reservation is possible or needed; visitors simply join the queue, order at the counter and eat on the spot. For anyone exploring Lucca's churches, towers and famous Renaissance walls, a stop at Pizzeria da Felice for a square of cecina or a slice of pizza is an easy and characterful introduction to the city's everyday food culture, and a reminder that some of Tuscany's most memorable eating is also its simplest and cheapest.