Il Pastaio

Great, fresh food!

I’m originally from Italy. While visiting Boulder I had dinner there: the pasta looks and tastes as if it was homemade, the sauce was tasty but balanced. This is not your round of the mill Italian restaurant, nor it is pretentious: it is truly family run. It is not capable of sitting a large number of customers so don’t try to go there with a party of 20 people. However if you’re looking for a «trattoria «type of situation, then you’ve got to try it.

Absolutely delicious! Best homemade pasta I’ve ever had, so tender and yummy. The sauces are great, personally I like the arrabiata (nice and spicy!) and the matriciani. The lasagna is also excellent, and the tiramisu is wonderful (and I’m not even that big of a tiramisu fan). The gnocchi is also solid, I could go on and on!
Not to mention, you can get homemade pasta and sauces to go which is an awesome alternative for a quick meal at home and if you can’t get a table.

we picked up some pasta and meatballs to cook at home… the pasta here is always good… but the meatballs… GROSS not sure if they were old or what. but they were the consistency of HARD RUBBER and they tasted disgusting. barely any flavor… i had to throw them out.

If you don’t think they deserve 5 stars, don’t talk to me. Over the last decade this has been my go to for both lunch and dinner. If you want some trendy lame fake Italian meal, don’t go here. This family makes very traditional, incredibly high quality food that you’ll do anything to try again. I can’t say enough good words about this restaurant. Over the years they have been very consistent, also. Don’t be the people that drop in for dinner, you’d better call first. The secret is out! They’ll always do their best to make room for you. Lunch is completely different. They totally switch it up and there’s a counter where you order and it’s very fast. It’s a great price too.

Got there again. Ordered the black pasta with seafood straight from the menu… And was completely underwhelmed, shame… Overcooked over salted pasta, but good tasting sea food…
The waiters carefree attitude is good but belong in a better restaurant.

This is my favorite Italian restaurant in the world. I have been numerous times and it is always awesome. It is hidden in a tiny strip mall near a King Soopers, but don’t let that stop you. The owners are legit from Italy and can barely speak english. They make all of the pasta in house and their anti-​pasta salad is great. My standard order is the Chicken Parm (Pollo Parmigiana), salad, and house wine. We also end it with a Tiramisu usually.
I can’t believe people give this place bad reviews over the atmosphere there. Yeah, it’s not a five star restaurant, but the food can compete. If you want super fancy, then go somewhere else, if you want amazing Italian food in Boulder, go here. One word of advice is to get there early, seating is super limited and the place always gets packed.

This is — as good as it gets. The pasta is better than your Italian grandmother’s pasta. The only complaint, is the small portion sizes. I could inhale one entrée of fresh-​made ravioli and my husband who eats twice as much is still hungry after, so we usually split 3 entrees or order sides.
The restaurant size makes it really hard to find a table, I think we’ve been lucky. However the small size makes it really feel even more authentically European!

Interesting place. The food is amazing– great gnocchi and awesome tiramisu. Can be very slow on occasion. My main gripe is guissepe, the owner– he is not the friendliest to say the least. Last time I went he stayed in back and I had a great time! But on a busy night he may be on the floor and beware– you could experience his short patience and sharp demeanor.

Hands-​down my favorite Italian watering hole. The Chianti is delicious, the atmosphere is cozy, and the service is above and beyond the norm. Seems to be family run and everyone works together well and has a good time. The food is fresh and absolutely delicious. You won’t be taking home a to go box…

Tried this place when S.O.‘s parents were in town. Everyone enjoyed their dishes. I had the vegetable lasagna and would definitely come back for more!

My wife and I went to Il Pastaio for our anniversary. Right off the bat, we noticed this place is really popular; always great to see. The small, hole-​in-​the-​wall atmosphere was great and the food was even better! We got the Four Cheese Ravioli with Aurora sauce and the Linguini Mare Nore. Finished up with Panna Cotta and Cappuccino. Five stars for the food.
Il Pastaio gets a four star review only because of the service. Our server was very attentive while he was at our table, but seemed stretched a little thin.
We will be going back because this place is that good.

Walked in and was underwhelmed by the atmosphere…
The table cloths were made of paper!!! Paper. Really?
The owner was rude and arrogant, asking us «What do you want» as if he was extremely pissed about something. The food was good… But way over priced!

I got a weird feeling coming in because it seemed more like a café than a restaurant. There weren’t any low tables and the dining area is too cramped. I’m used to walking to a podium to be seated but here we walked in and a man behind the dessert counter held up 2 fingers to see if it was just us two, then he pointed at a table across from him for us to sit at… no one walked us over or anything.
I of course looked this restaurant up on Unilocal while waiting for water and it had great reviews for the most part. I thought that maybe I had been too quick to judge. I ordered the chicken with mozzarella and tomato with pasta (I forgot the actual name of the dish) and it was $ 19.50, which led me to believe it would be amazing. When our food came out I was not impressed by my plating or portion. Like I said, it was quite expensive. I began cutting into the chick and to my horror, IT WAS RAW. I have had undercooked meat in a restaurant before but never raw. It was completely pink as if it were just taken out of the packaging. I told my waiter and he took it back and got me a new one.
The waiter was extremely kind about all of it and offered us a free dessert, and brought me a new one boxed up (I haven’t checked if it is cooked) which was nice, but he didn’t take the food off the bill. So we still paid almost $ 20 for a raw and unimpressive entrée. We tried a new place to change things up and I will likely not return. The weird vibe and undercooked food turned me off and ruined my appitite.

This place would have been so great had it not been for the very slow service and unpleasant seating. Granted, I came here with a friend on a Friday evening without a reservation, so we were lucky to be seated whatsoever, but we unfortunately got the only tiny table outdoors, in the sweltering summer heat. We felt pretty much forgotten about, and waited over half and hour to be served. After we had paid, the waiter also forgot to give my friend the leftover food she had sent to be boxed.
The food also was not as good as I had hoped. I got the mushroom ravioli with pesto sauce, and my friend got spaghetti and meatballs. I also had a tiramisu for dessert. The ravioli was pretty tasty, but writing this a few weeks later, I barely remember it. The tiramisu was very yummy, so no complaints there except that I was too full at that point to enjoy it to the max. The food here is fresh for the most part, but I’m left not quite impressed.

This whole-​in-​the-​wall family-​owned place is great if you need a date spot or if you’re hosting someone. I love the atmosphere, and as far as ethnic food goes in Colorado it’s out of this world.
I usually go for the Arrabiatta or Aurora sauce on Capellini, unless I get tempted by the daily special. This might sound dumb, but my absolute favorite thing there is their dinner rolls: P
Don’t forget they’re closed on weekends.

Went in for dinner randomly on a Friday night. Luckily we arrived before 6 because the place filled up pretty quickly!
I enjoyed everything with my only complaint being that the waiter forgot to offer butter or herbed olive oil with bread and it took us a while to get our drinks (which were just bottled sodas). Small things and waiters get busy I have been there it happens :)
We shared a Caprese salad to start which is a favorite and didn’t disappoint. The tomatoes were thick and perfectly crisp but not underripe.
For entrée I had the zucca ravioli with butter sage sauce and my love had the chicken parm with a side of linguini alfredo.
For dessert we shared a scoop each of Rosemary and Raspberry sorbet.
We can’t wait to go back :)

What a total disappointment in every conceivable way. We gave each other the ‘uh-​oh’ glance after we were seated and had a chance to look around a little. The place just felt flat and uninteresting. But it wouldn’t be the first time that great food more than made up for other shortcomings, so we kept an open mind. Mistake, should have followed the first instinct and ran like hell…
Bread —
The bread reminded me of the buns from elementary school. There’s a special smell, texture, and lack of crispy crust. And by special I mean that they would have been much better off to get the bread next door at the grocery store bakery. Had to ask for butter, and were brought exactly two melted individually wrapped pats.
Wine —
We asked for a dry white Italian, and paid an extra few bucks for the suggested selection and it was sweet with a very slight dry finish. So you’re on your own in the wine dept. they know nothing.
Salad —
The arugula and palm heart salad was almost entirely straight from a jar or can, including the pre-​grated parm cheese. Ok, maybe the actual pasta dishes will make up for the cafeteria quality so far…
Main Course —
Finally the pasta arrives, and the black pasta with seafood was ok. Not stunning, but totally acceptable. But the capellini was a dense mash of stuck together undercooked glop. Ok, mistakes happen, so we sent that back. While we waited I marveled at the Dixie paper bowl that was left on the table with a spoon in it…
Here is where it goes from slightly less than mediocre to batshit crazy strange. The owner comes over to ‘explain’ the difference between boxed pasta and fresh pasta, and that the real problem is, we just don’t know what real fresh pasta is. If we want boxed pasta we should go somewhere else. Well, he picked the wrong table upon which to broadcast his bullshit, as we’ve both spent extended time in Italy, my partner living in the region for two years. Well that, and we actually make our own pasta from time to time at home. So the idea is that the ‘correct’ way to present capellini is in a single pile of stuck together density that more closely resembles mashed potatoes than pasta. Wow, does anyone actually believe this guy’s nonsense? Can he actually talk someone into liking this pile of crap?
We were so dumbstruck neither of us said anything for a moment. Then my partner gets up to leave, and I stand as well. I offer to pay for the uncorked wine and crappy salad. The owner seems happy for us to go, and shortly returns with a bill that includes everything but the capellini, so here we go again. I should have just walked out after leaving $ 5 for the server, but I was morbidly fascinated at the workings of this place. It was like a scene from some chef nightmare show where the owner is making an ass out of himself in front of a Friday night crowd of his patrons, and yet remains convinced that he is right, and the world is wrong.
I had to actually show the owner his own wine list for him to correct the price of the crappy wine I allowed myself to get stuck with. He just didn’t miss a chance to do the wrong thing. Anyway, I finally paid more than I should have, just over $ 50 for all this fun, and took my leave.
So maybe we just had a rare experience, and the wonderful reviews raving about the great food are the norm. Or maybe some people don’t know the difference between shit and apple butter. But this place certainly didn’t pass the ‘is it better than I can make at home?’ test, and the rude and arrogant response of the owner that probably often works to beat others questions or complaints into submission is unacceptable, regardless of any disagreement on the quality of the glop they call capellini pasta.
Food is overpriced AND bad, the owner is nuts, but strangely entertaining in a Car 54 sort of way.

Whenever I’m craving great pasta and the feeling I get when my grandma makes me pasta sauce, I think about Il Pastaio.
There’s no going wrong here. The gnocchi are sublime, and I particularly like the bolognese, aurora, and basilico sauces. The squid ink pasta is also delicious. Ravioli are always a nice treat – and the kitchen staff know how to properly cook pasta al dente.
I’d recommend calling ahead for reservations as the location is not super large, and you may feel awkward upon entering and standing in the dining area.

I LOVE THIS PLACE,!!
When I first came here, I tried their Gnocchi, which is a potato pasta. It tasted very fresh but it wasn’t my favorite. Not anything wrong on the restaurant or chef’s end, just personally too heavy for me. I love potato but to eat it as a pasta was a little boring.
Then I tried the Arrabiatta sauce with Linguini and it was out of this world! Not only is their Arrabiatta sauce the most amazing spicy marinara sauce, the Linguini is extremely fresh and homemade!
And tonight, I had the Friday Night Special, Cioppino and my boyfriend had the Linguini Mare Nero. The Cioppino is a seafood stew and Linguini Mare Nero is a seafood pasta dish. They were both very delicious! The Cioppino is more on the expensive side but totally worth it. The stew was not too salty, not too sweet and spot on. Everything tasted delicious but the slice of bread that comes with the Cioppino was hard as a rock. For an Italian restaurant that makes delicious pasta, they make some horrible bread. Even the bread they serve prior to your meal is not the best. However, the entrée was spot on! Also, it might be the asian in me coming out but I did feel that since I couldn’t eat the bread, it felt like something missing. I needed some type of carb like bread, rice or pasta! Linguini Mare Nero on the other hand was flawless. From fresh seafood to the sauce to the squid ink pasta, I LOVED everything about the dish.
Then, for dessert, we ordered one scoop of Ginger and one scoop of Cappuccino Gelato. When we ordered Ginger, we imagined a flavor that is so refreshing that it cleanses our palate. Boy, were we wrong! The Ginger Gelato was very flavorful and creamy but nothing we imagined and for those reasons, not the best. However, the Cappuccino Gelato was AMAZING! Very flavorful, seriously felt like I was drinking iced coffee! And it was very creamy and a great way to end a meal.
TIPS:
(1) Sometimes, the staff can be a little rude when the restaurants gets a little busy but once you sit down, they are very friendly. Food wise, this place is good so give them a try!
(2) Keep in mind, there is a table near the restrooms and that is normally for people who don’t make reservations so make a reservation! This place gets very busy on Friday nights since they are not open on the weekends so making reservations might be the way to go. I know we did before going tonight.
(3) Like I said, they are closed on the weekends so go during the week and don’t find it the hard way and get highly disappointed like me. :)
HIGHLY RECOMMEND & here are some pictures I took from tonight!

Ich hatte Meatballs mit hausgemachten Linguine und als Dessert Tiramisu.
Das Essen war hervorragend.