14 Calif. Eateries Named Among 50 Best Italian Restaurants In America

Fourteen California eateries have landed on a well-respected list of the top 50 Italian restaurants in America. Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego area restaurants all earned spots on The Daily Meal’s 2017 ranking of America’s 50 Best Italian Restaurants, which was released last week.

The Daily Meal said it assembled the ranking by building a list that’s as “thorough and comprehensive as possible.”

“We recruited an illustrious panel of judges that included some of the country’s top food writers, critics, and bloggers to submit their suggestions for the country’s best restaurants, which we supplemented with our own choices, including previous years’ rankings as well as lauded newcomers,” according to the article.

Here are the California restaurants who managed to snag a spot on the list:

#41 Una Pizza Napoletana, San Francisco

The Daily Meal says in part: There are only five pies, all $25, plus a special Saturday-only pie, the Apollonia, made with eggs, Parmigiano-Reggiano, buffalo mozzarella, salami, extra-virgin olive oil, basil, garlic, sea salt, and black pepper. But when you’re this close to godliness, you don’t need extras. Keep it simple with the Margherita (San Marzano tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella, extra-virgin olive oil, fresh basil, sea salt, tomato sauce) and know the good.

#37 Flour + Water, San Francisco

The Daily Meal says in part: Although this San Francisco restaurant claims to specialize in house-made pastas, its pizza is formidable. Baked in a wood-fired oven, the thin-crust pizza at Flour + Water blends Old World tradition with modern refinement, according to chef and co-owner Thomas McNaughton.

#35 Davanti Enoteca, Chicago and San Diego

The Daily Meal says in part: Communal tables made from reclaimed wood and bare brick walls create the ideal ambiance for a meal filled with hearty Italian fare, including a wide variety of salumi and cheese; fiendishly delicious truffled egg toast; pastas including expertly prepared cacio e pepe and pork cheek and ricotta gnudi; and mains like seared day boat scallops with fava beans, pea tendrils, and guanciale.

#32 Bestia, Los Angeles

The Daily Meal says in part: Standout menu items include a wide selection of housemade salumi, roasted marrow bone with spinach gnocchetti, pizza with housemade spicy ‘nduja and black cabbage, and spaghetti with lobster and sea urchin.

#30 Vincenti Ristorante, Los Angeles

The Daily Meal says in part: The menu is comforting and classic, with pastas including house-made fusilli with Sonoma lamb ragu and squid ink risotto with lobster and asparagus; wood-burning-oven entrées include their legendary whole roasted Dover sole, sliced New York steak with herb raviolo, and house-made pork sausage with Brussels sprouts and roasted potatoes; and on Monday their thin-crust pizzas are some of the best around.

#28 Dan Tana’s, Los Angeles

The Daily Meal says in part: This West Hollywood joint owned by Yugoslav-American restaurateur and former professional footballer Dan Tana may not be as exclusive, but this is Hollywood’s version of New York’s Rao’s, another restaurant known more for lore than linguini.

#24 Bistro don Giovanni, Napa Valley

The Daily Meal says in part: The menu features simple pizzas and pastas, sustainably-farmed local fruits, vegetables, and organic meats.

#22 Oliveto, Oakland, Calif.

The Daily Meal says in part: The menu changes daily, but always features unexpected local fare like pan-roasted Monterrey Bay sardines (with fregola) and Santa Barbara sea urchin (with spaghetti in tomato sauce), and purveyors are always listed on the menu.

#21 Delfina, San Francisco

The Daily Meal says in part: Fresh pastas, including chicken agnolotti with lemon-chive burro fuso, pappardelle with Liberty duck sugo, and spaghetti with a simple tomato sauce are the claim to fame, but other dishes including grilled Monterey Bay calamari and roasted chicken with king trumpet mushrooms and olive oil mashed potatoes are exemplars of Northern California cuisine.

#17 Cotogna, San Francisco

The Daily Meal says in part: Don’t miss pastas like strozapretti cacao e pepe, foie gras tortelli, and perhaps most important, the raviolo di ricotta with fresh farm egg and brown butter.

#8 chi SPACCA, Los Angeles

The Daily Meal says in part: At this Silverton-Batali-Bastianich restaurant, accompaniments like warm salted medjool dates and smoked burrata with roasted parsnips are just sideshows for the rest of this meat-centric menu.

#7 Valentino, Santa Monica

The Daily Meal says in part: Yes, you can have prosciutto and melon or spaghetti alla carbonara here, and they’ll be impeccable, but why not try the crudita di pesce (Italian “suchi” marinated with citrus and colatura di alici, a kind of anchovy syrup), the lasagne della nonna (grandmother’s lasagna) with mushroom and duck ragù, or the veal ossobuco with risotto milanese?

#5 Osteria Mozza, Los Angeles

The Daily Meal says in part: There’s a mozzarella bar with some dozen options; a menu that includes fantastic (and sometimes unusual) pasta (goat cheese ravioli with “five lilies,” meaning five members of the allium family)…

#4 Quince, San Francisco

The Daily Meal says in part: Located in a historic brick and timber building dating back to 1907 in San Francisco’s Jackson Square neighborhood, the recently redesignedQuince is both charming and elegant (there’s a new entrance, private dining rooms, and a chef’s counter).

You can check out the whole list here.

Tom Davis (Patch Staff) contributed to this article / Image via Pixabay