🇺🇸 Best Italian Restaurant in Carmel-by-the-Sea! 🍝

🍴 PortaBella 📍 Ocean Ave, Carmel-By-The-Sea, CA 93921 Visited this popular handmade pasta spot with friends last weekend – and wow, it blew my mind! 😍 For me, the ultimate test of an Italian restaurant is their Carbonara… and this one was rich, creamy, and absolutely PERFECT 🥓🍳 It shot straight to the top of my list of best Italian restaurants outside Italy! (Haven’t been to Italy yet 😢 but I’ve tried plenty across Europe – and this beats even my previous fave, Joya in Bath! 🏆) Their creamy pastas and risottos are fantastic, though the tomato-based dishes are a bit less impressive. The meat dishes are solid but not mind-blowing. Here’s what we tried👇： 🍝 Pasta Alla Carbonara Smoky guanciale + egg yolk & cheese sauce clinging to wide handmade noodles. Rich? Yes. Worth it? ABSOLUTELY. ⚠️💥 🍄 Classic Wild Mushroom Risotto Perfectly cooked rice (not too al dente – great for Chinese taste buds!), loaded with wild mushrooms and cheese. So flavorful! 🦀 Roasted Corn and Crab Bisque Bowl Sweet, creamy, and generous portion. Shared between four of us! 😆 🥩 Oven Braised Short Ribs Tender, juicy ribs with deep red wine sauce. Veggies were simple but fine. 🍅 Fresh Tuscan Pappardelle Al Pomodoro A bit underwhelming – sauce was light and lacked depth. Good noodles though. 🍤 Skewer Grilled Jumbo Prawns Pretty standard – nothing special. ⏳ Wait was long but worth it! Perfect after a beach walk 🌊👌 #UCBerkeley #StudyInUSA #BayAreaFood #HiddenRestaurantGems #CarmelByTheSea