Pastaio — Restaurant in London

Pastaio (meaning pasta maker!) serves fresh, delicious and affordable pasta in Soho just off Carnaby Street. They pride themselves on cooking with high quality, sustainable produce with eggs from Rodley Court in Kent, ricotta freshly made everyday in West London and organic grains and tomatoes from the southern Italian.

Their restaurant in Carnaby Street has bright, vibrant murals on the walls with (mostly) communal seating on black stools and large hanging light features. Pastaio has a relaxed, almost canteen style, to the restaurant.

Pastaio offer a small selection of white and red wine from just £4.50 a glass. They also offer four cocktails, including Aperol Spritz and Negroni for just £6-7 and prosecco slushies from just £4.50. We sipped on an Aperol and a white grape prosecco slushy during our meal.

I was dining with a vegan guest and the wonderful John talked us through the menu ticking what she could have and underlining what would need to be removed. Really great to see.

The antipasti section has 8 choices priced between £3-9.5. We were drawn to the Fried mozzarella, ‘nduja & honey sandwich (£5.5). As expected, it was served as a toastie but the nduja did not shine through as much as I hoped. It has real potential with the mixture of ingredients (especially the addition of honey) but the ratios need to change.

The Squash, red cabbage, hazelnuts & ricotta salata (which we had wihtout the ricotta to make it vegan) was a light and refreshing dish. The hazelnuts added a great texture.

There are 8 pasta dishes ranging from just £6 (amazing value for Soho) to £16.5 for seafood linguine. We opted for the Crusco Chilli, rocket, breadcrumbs, spinach spaghetti (£6) which had nutty, savoury flavours and the spaghetti was tasty and al dente.

We could not resist the Squash Ravioli, butter, sage (£12). Wow, this was amazing. The pasta was clearly freshly made with slightly al dente ravioli edges and a beautiful squash filling. With the butter and sage sauce, it was an extremely satisfying dish.

If you are looking for great pasta in Soho, Pastaio is your place! The dishes were fresh and delicious whilst not breaking the bank. The service was friendly and the atmosphere was buzzing. Pastaio also have venues in Market Halls West End and...

I'm Italian living in London for more than a decade now, so by definition, when I want pasta, I cook my own at home... and I don't live in the centre. But often, when I am living the city evening life and I end up in saying something like "ok let's have bite somewhere". And that bite is oftem a burger, a pizza a wok, some dimsum, maybe a Ramen... well, from now on, and until this place lasts, I will also be saying, "Let's have some pasta."

The menu is short and concise (beware of italian place with very long menus... they couldn't be farest from being authentic) and moderately creative, without becoming unneededly complicated. The portions are well balanced. The final result is no no-sense fluf, just very good fresh pasta with good taste and no heavy belly filler around it. The kids' menu was well thought and not the usual workaround of the regular menu. I particularly appreciated the touch of adding some carrots and cucumber sticks next to the kids' pasta. All british young kids have this vegetable served like that in the nurseries. And every time we ask for it, the waiters usually look at us like we are asking a sushi of porcini mushroom. And instead, this time we got them without asking... in a restaurant of italian pasta... in London.

The atmosfere was quite pleasent, and for the service, we made a straightforward order clear mind of what we wanted. We had the feeling that the simplicity of dealing with us as customers was really appreciated and we found our waitress really nice. Cannot comment on how the service would manage a more difficult situation. But I generally I believe that being a nice customer in central London it always improves your dining experience. This was one of the cases that back strongly my statement.

These places near Carnaby Street come and go. But I seriously hope that...

My daughter and I visited Pastaio after seeing Evita at the London Palladium yesterday ( 23/8/25) Hannah had already been here previously and knew this was my kind of food! And boy, she wasn't wrong!!! We were lucky enough to be given a table outside, and was great as we could soak up the atmosphere of Carnaby Street. We ordered drinks A glass of Prosecco and Wine Spritzer for me! For our starter we had Burrata, along with Focaccia Bread. Never in my life had I tasted Burrata such as Pastaio's, it was delicious and went perfectly with the bread. It was very tasty and very moreish! For our mains we had Ligurian Basil Pesto, Green Beans, Potato, Lasagnette and Pork Cheek Ragu, Porcini, Parsley, Parmesan, Hand Cut Pappardelle. They were beautifully cooked and so tasty. They both achieved 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 for us. Authentic Italian food at it's best. We finished with Tiramisu, which we shared as we were bursting at the seams. All of the portion sizes are so generous and I would be surprised if anyone ever left not feeling full and satisfied! As for the Tiramisu.. Can I have the recipe please? It was THE BEST we have ever tasted.. And lastly, the best thing that we had overall was our Server Awo... From the second we arrived, she was friendly, attentive, but more importantly caring! Nothing was too much trouble, in fact she pre-empted our needs before we knew we needed them!! What a lovely, lovely young lady!! To The owners reading this .. Please tell Awo .. Thank you from us.. You made a magical day out for us into perfection just by meeting you!! . And please give her a raise!!! 😀 Thank you Pastaio for everything.. We will be back!! From Debbie & Hannah (...