4 Best Restaurants in The Bay Area, California

This classic Italian meets Californian menu is a stellar value where three courses clock in at less than $40 (the optional supplements are worth adding on). The quality is sky high, with no corners cut. It's an energetic, fun place with guests of all ages coming to enjoy exciting pastas preceded by a soup or salad. Each course has two options to choose from.

Kim Levin’s ode to rustic Italian cuisine in a lofty, natural light–filled space continues to thrill fervent regulars each week. Around 10 pastas are offered each evening, making it very difficult for diners to decide from the many tempting options. Classic preparations like tagliatelle Bolognese and spaghetti puttanesca are given unique touches, like adding pancetta to the former and day-boat scallops to the latter. The adjacent lounge shakes and stirs Half Moon Bay’s best cocktails.

Poggio serves modern Tuscan comfort food in a handsome, old world–inspired space. An extensive and ever-changing menu, with ingredients sourced from the restaurant's garden and local farms, features local and Italian wines, fresh fish, and wood-fired pizzas. The bar is a locals' favorite serving great Negroni cocktails from iconic bartender Tony Negroni. Breakfast favorites include house-made Liège waffles, croissant paninis, and intense coffee.

Palo Alto is filled with Italian restaurants, but the best in town resides in Leland Stanford’s old brick barn (where Stanford's own wines were produced), on the edge of campus. Homemade pastas are served with an idyllic toothsome al dente texture. Not to be outdone, the puffy Neapolitan pizzas are equally notable and any mozzarella starter is worth an order. Since it’s removed from the slightly congested downtown, the restaurant has plenty of outdoor space in a charming courtyard. The bar is a popular post-work hangout for the nearby medical center and stirs one of the finest Negronis around (with amaro Montenegro replacing vermouth).