Torchio Pasta Bar – Chicago’s best-kept secret brings old Italian flavors to the Windy City

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Located on 738 North Wells St. in Chicago, Torchio Pasta Bar is the local favorite restaurant you’ve been looking for. Crowded with repeat customers and bar seating so popular you cannot reserve it, Bill Varley equates his establishment to the TV show “Cheers” – a claim he made after saying a fond farewell to one of his usuals. This loving atmosphere isn’t just another Olive Garden-branded “When you’re here, you’re family,” but a true statement that weaves itself into Torchio’s very core, down to the details of the building and the deliciously crafted menu.

Before you enter through the black door frame, the story has already begun. While on a business trip in the city back when Varley was an Engineer Deputy, he fell in love with Chicago and later moved there from Long Island in 2016 once he retired from his job. When it came time to build Torchio, Varley said he built it himself and showed my photographer and me a photo of him doing so. The storefront is of glass windows and varnished black wood, while the interior is a stunning, modern mix of red brick, black upholstery and light brown floors. Standing on the right-most wall is the centerpiece of the establishment – the bar. Varley said he spent nearly eight years drawing up plans for it and recreated it almost exactly – it’s no wonder the bar’s stools are his go-to haunt while at his restaurant.

Seats taken, eyes go to the handpicked menu that also has sentimentality behind each edition. Varley spent lots of time traveling throughout Italy with his wife, where he learned to cook classic Italian dishes from what he called the “nonna network.” These Italian grandmothers became such an inspiration that Varley said he named the restaurant’s bolognese for the very woman who taught him to perfect it, Giovanna Cardinali. While he had the skills to pay the bills, Varley said it wasn’t until one Christmas Eve while making pasta with his niece – a yearly tradition – that he got the idea of what to serve at his restaurant when she exclaimed, “Who doesn’t like pasta!”

But do you know what else people like? Saffron Arancini. For those who don’t know, this appetizer is essentially a fried mac and cheese ball’s hotter, older cousin. Perfectly cooked rice is stuffed with bolognese and mozzarella and fried to golden-brown-delicious with an immaculate crunch factor. This dish comes served with a Calabrian chili garlic tomato sauce that absolutely sings. The main flavor of the sauce isn’t heavily simmered spices, but the freshness of the tomatoes, which makes it taste a lot lighter even when accompanied by the fried arancini. Another kudos to the sauce is how spicy it is. Much to my surprise, it actually had quite a kick that left a lingering sensation on the taste buds. While the spice was intense, what allowed me to clean the dish with my bread sponge was the mozzarella, which gave the sauce a creaminess that took the edge off the spice.

When deciding on which of the 21 pastas to get, while you cannot go wrong with any of them, my colleague and I landed on the Sunday Meat Sauce – as recommended to us by Mr. Beef’s very own Chris Zucchero – and the Braised Short Rib and Pappardelle.

The Sunday Meat Sauce – a mighty collection of ground beef, braised pork shoulder and fresh pressed tomato sauce, all served on a rigatoni crowned with whipped ricotta – brings to the table a deceptive cornucopia of pasta. Plated in a wide rim bowl that gives the appearance of a wide-brimmed sun hat, a first glance would leave you thinking: “ten bites tops.” This fortunately proves to be wrong as each new forkful of rigatoni reveals another layer below, another round of warm and tender pasta bathed in a meat and tomato sauce that Varley told us was cooked freshly in a Chianti wine with a mixture of other traditional herbs. The beef and pork were equally well-cooked and blended well with the al dente texture of the rigatoni. Though I might not have reordered a Bee’s Knees cocktail to pair with this dish (a cab might have been a wiser match), I was pleasantly refreshed by the honey hints that came in this bathtub gin, a Depression drink.

The Braised Short Rib is a favorite amongst Varley and the table behind me alike, and from the first bite, it’s not hard to see why. The short rib is braised in Chianti wine, on the bone, with brown sugar and veal glaze for four hours, and you can absolutely taste it. The flavor of the red wine is infused into and heightens the beefiness of the short rib, while the brown sugar and veal glaze add a hint of sweetness to pull it back from being overwhelmingly rich. Texturally, the beef is also fantastic as it simultaneously manages to be both uber tender while still maintaining a great chew.

If the beef wasn’t good enough, the pappardelle was chef’s kiss. All the pasta is made fresh in-house, and you taste the difference it makes, instantly. The pasta has an incredible bite and a definite flavor reminiscent of butternut squash, and gives the meaty dish an oaky nuttiness. Since the short rib and pasta both have a sweet, sticky quality to them, they both stick on your teeth and taste buds a little longer, allowing you to further relish their wonderfully well-balanced savory, sweet flavors. And just a note, the Short Rib paired excellently with the Cabernet Sauvignon, which had notable legs.

Dishes were cleared with more bread sponges, and desserts were ordered. The first was yet another recommendation from Zucchero – the Lemon Olive Oil Cake. This dessert was the right way to end off a heavy carb-based meal as it was brightly flavored, citrus forward and lightly sweet from the caramelized and powdered sugar topping. The cake itself had a super moist crumb, not overly dense but just the right amount to add a bit of heart to your forkful.

The second dessert was an espresso powder-less Tiramisu. In light of this key ingredient’s absence, espresso cold brew is used instead, which gives this twist on a classic a much stronger coffee taste. Also, instead of being dusted with espresso, it instead sprinkled with cocoa powder. While again, more on the untraditional end of the spectrum, the subtle chocolate flavor brought out the nuttiness of the coffee. The whipped topping was a vanilla-flavored, whipped cloud, and the lady fingers were super saturated in the cold brew, giving them a cakey consistency. While these changes worked for some, the break from tradition isn’t a universal crowd pleaser.

Varley said Torchio is Chicago’s best-kept secret, and after an overall, delectably satisfying meal, it is not hard to taste why.