Seattle Kitchen Review: Cantinetta in Wallingford

Pasta is handmade at Cantinetta in Wallingford. (Image courtesy Cantinetta)

The Seattle restaurant highlighted on this week’s Seattle Kitchen Show is not only being praised for the warmth of its atmosphere, but also for the hotness of its staff.

In a discussion of Cantinetta, in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood, two of the Seattle Kitchen show team noted the food isn’t the only reason to seek out this hidden neighborhood restaurant.

“When I went to Cantinetta all the servers were crazy hot? Was that your experience there?” asked Seattle Kitchen edible correspondent Katie O.

Host Tom Douglas said he also had spotted a beauty on the Cantinetta staff.

“The main waitress there,” said Douglas. “She was a waitress at the Il Bistro, in the bar for years, and I had the biggest crush on her, beautiful long hair. Then I was at Cantinetta and I saw her and I thought, this is my kind of restaurant.”

Getting back to the food, Douglas described it as “country Italian.”

“It takes license, like Americans do. It’s not the kind of food necessarily you’d find in Italy, but it’s certainly got that essence.”

Co-host Theirry Rautureau tried a duck pasta dish on his visit.

“That was delicious,” said Rautureau. “Absolutely fantastic.”

Rautureau said the dish was very well made.

“They make all their own pasta,” said Rautureau. “It looks like a labor of love. You can imagine the little mama in the back rolling those and stuffing the ravioli on the big wood table.”

The Seattle Kitchen staff agrees it’s a very warm, cute neighborhood Italian restaurant.

Cantinetta not only serves customers in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood. They also have a location in Bellevue. The Seattle Kitchen team did not know how the Bellevue location staff compares to its Seattle counterpart.

Seattle Kitchen airs on 97.3 KIRO FM on Saturdays at 8 a.m. and Sunday at 10 a.m. Available ON DEMAND anytime at MyNorthwest.com.

By JAMIE GRISWOLD, MyNorthwest.com Editor