Reviews for Toscano Restaurant

06/01/2024 - Anthony B.
Breathtaking!

12/23/2007 - Foodophile
I think I have tried almost every restaurant that features Tuscan food. And finally I have found the motherlode. Homemade pastas, great grilled meats, fantastic and affordable wine lists, attentive servers--and an wonderful choice of informal and formal seating. What more could one ask for. Authentic and rare.

07/09/2006 - John
An intimate café and small lounge opens onto a secluded dining area where chef Vinicio Paoli serves soups, salads, pasta, and meat dishes that are meant to be enjoyed leisurely. The oak charcoal grill turns out beef, pork, veal, and Cornish hen.

No place else in Boston captures the simplicity and lack of fuss of real country Italian food, specifically food from Tuscany. That's because nowhere else is run by northern Italians who know how plain that food is. Florence-born chef Vinicio Paoli shuns trends, so don't expect overly decorated plates or nouvelle touches. Do expect properly prepared risotto, feather-light pastas, and Tuscan specialties such as charcoal-grilled sirloin that Paoli ages himself and cacciucco (a seafood stew in spicy tomato sauce and fish stock).

Real Italian food isn't about layering precious specialty ingredients into one impressive dish. It's about honest, simple ingredients that spotlight intense flavors. So it is at Toscano, Charles Street's beloved tribute to Northern Italy. The space, divided by brick walls hung with cooking instruments, antique maps, and hand painted plates, is rustic Tuscan through and through. As is the welcome. And the food. Chef Vinicio Paoli whips up such traditionalist as vitello tonnato, roasted veal sliced thin as a dime and smothered with fresh tuna sauce, and a risotto that highlights nothing more complicated than earthy, meaty wild porcini.