
Though it isn’t the most heralded form of cuisine in Houston, Italian definitely has its put. Every neighborhood seems to have at the very least 1 purple-sauce spot excellent for those people Friday nights more than a low-priced bottle of wine, and if you want a intimate evening with impeccable provider and handmade pasta that’ll make your eyes roll back … we have obtained that, as well.
(Critically, have you even experimented with the pappardelle at Giacomo’s?)
Down below is a variety of our most loved spots for—among other pleasures—cacio e pepe, pepperoni pizza, and antipasta.
Antica Osteria
One particular of Houston’s much more lovable romantic restaurants, Antica Osteria serves a amazing spaghetti aglio e olio topped with shrimp, alongside with a good Bolognese and a passable puttanesca, in an aged-fashioned eating place with tons of Frank Sinatra tunes on the seem procedure. The restaurant’s outdoor patio with a pergola is excellent for cooler evenings, it’s possible while tending to a glass of Tuscan wine.
Cavatore
Move inside of the aged barn off Ella Boulevard in Lazybrook/Timbergrove, and be prepared to love a salad. Indeed, the Caesar at Cavatore, prepared desk-side with home made dressing, is a strike. Otherwise, you happen to be in this article for red-sauce delights like spaghetti marinara and the veal-and-cheese-stuffed cannelloni della casa, excellent for splitting within the cozy, wood-walled dining area with tables dressed with crimson-checkerboard tablecloth.
Coltivare
Morgan Weber and chef Ryan Pera’s handsome Heights eatery is best for both dates and teams. Outside tables sit basically in finding length from the lifted-bed gardens, wherever the cafe grows most of its herbs and some of its salad ingredients. Appetizers include cauliflower, with pine nuts and raisins, and crackers, with smoked trout dip and pickled mustard seeds. Really don’t overlook the pizzas (rooster and prosciutto, specifically), seafood pastas (fettuccine with Gulf shrimp), or fish dishes (striped bass with sunchokes).
Coppa Osteria
Peer into the “dough room” to enjoy as pastas and pizzas are created by hand at this lively Italian location. Standouts include things like the beef carpaccio, the Houston Dairymaids cheese board, the chicken parmesan, the pepperoni and goat cheese pie, and, specifically, the divine, evenly creamy spaghetti carbonara with salumi toscano and an egg that is damaged desk-aspect by your server.
Giacomo’s Cibo e Vino
Owner/chef Lynette Hawkins has succeeded in preserving her cozy Italian café both of those informal and significant-good quality considering that opening in 2009. Her little plates and accompanying compact charges really encourage you to buy, experiment, and share (really do not pass up the eggplant involtini), while the restaurant is perhaps finest regarded for its exemplary spaghetti carbonara with guanciale and a farm-clean egg. (Also, that gorgonzola and mushroom pappardelle is to die for.) A progressive bottle checklist attributes a great deal of biodynamic options and spotlights Italy’s myriad woman winemakers.
La Griglia
The splashy dining space in this Italian stronghold, the undisputed power-lunch palace of River Oaks, hosts Houston’s social established through the working day. The generous $19 prix-fixe organization lunch provides two trustworthy programs of expectations, this sort of as Caesar salad and pork chop with potato puree. For meal, favorites like frutti di mare and short rib agnolotti purpose to please. For even larger appetites, the wild boar chop (referred to as Gallagher) in aged sherry-morel sauce will make a hefty statement.
North Italia
Positioning alone as a sexier upscale-everyday Italian cafe, this chain (formerly of Arizona’s Fox Restaurant Concepts) offers shareable plates like prosciutto bruschetta and black Mediterranean mussels, moreover pizzas (we propose the Pig with spicy pepperoni, soppressata, and sausage) and selfmade pasta dishes. Test to snag a seat experiencing the glass-walled kitchen, where cooks scurry about earning sensitive pastas like tortelloni and radiatori, that 50 %-spiral that sops up parmesan product sauce in a mouthwatering dish with limited rib.

Ostia
On the patio at Travis McShane’s return to Houston is in which I want to be. Give me a glass of Sangiovese, and buy me the pork chop Milanese, a hefty and tender lower meant for a couple of party friends. I am going to be delighted all evening with that on your own. Of class, there is certainly also the 50 percent rooster, beautifully browned with a lemony tweak. That dish is a nod to McShane’s mentor Jonathan Waxman, who made the definitive version of half chicken at New York’s Barbuto. Ostia feels a ton like a New York restaurant with some Cali effortlessness … or specifically the sort of place that would open in Texas in 2020.
Paulie’s
One of Montrose’s most adored places for comfort and ease foods, Paulie’s is however likely robust with homemade pasta dishes focused on unique types, like the frilly, U-shaped creste di gallo—tossed with sausage, chili flakes, and pickled onions in marinara—and tiny, chubby, and ear-like canestri—served with crimini and shiitake mushrooms and a creamy marsala sauce with garlic and sage. Paulie’s also crafts just one of the finer Italian hoagies in Houston, using genoa salami and ham with provolone in oil and vinegar. Don’t sleep on the stunning shrimp BLT, both. Of system, some shortbread cookies make a Paulie’s meal full.
Pizaro’s Pizza Napoletana
The Neapolitan pies at Pizaro’s are strong, but, without a doubt, the get to make listed here is from the Detroit-fashion menu. Rectangular and workmanlike Detroit-model pie emphasizes a crispy crust and an extremely-rich topping of brick cheese, and Pizaro’s nails it. The Motown (very little pepperoni cups, moreover additional pepperoni underneath the cheese) is a basic but don’t fail to remember the Vesuvius with ghost-pepper sausage and spicy soppressata.
Potente
Astros owner Jim Crane envisioned a stylish space for pre-and-article-activity dining when he opened this place across from Minute Maid Park downtown, but it is so significantly a lot more than that. Appear below to knowledge la dolce vita, finish with an opulent, gilded atmosphere, refined wine provider, and cuisine from longtime Brennan’s chef Danny Trace. Ought to-orders involve the lobster saffron bisque, caviar provider, and house-made spaghetti al tartufo nero with black truffle—but of course—shaved table-side.
Roma
Final January owner Shannon Scott rebranded the high-quality-dining eatery Sud Italia, which opened at the corner of Morningside and College in 2015, as Roma, a considerably less pricey, far more informal spot. Chef Angelo Cuppone focuses on typical and contemporary Roman cuisine, although sprinkling in a couple attempted-and-correct Italian favorites. The bolognese is good, but our beloved product on the pasta menu is the tender gnocchi served with shrimp in a smoky, velvety saffron sauce.
Tony’s
Chef de cuisine Austin Waiter’s innovative tasting menu, which adjustments often, wows with the kind of dishes that should make the Michelin Guideline take see: a duck press for two, pan-seared Dover sole with meunière sauce, and that famous gigantic soufflé. Increase in any of the residence-designed pastas and the normally-impeccable assistance at this Greenway Plaza favourite, and there is cause to believe that that Tony’s is nevertheless at the prime of its match after more than 50 a long time in business.