Los Angeles One-Michelin-Starred Italian Restaurant Opens in Austin

Pasta|Bar, the Italian restaurant from the Sushi by Scratch team that was awarded a Michelin star in Los Angeles, is now open in Austin as of March 13. Pasta|Bar is located at 1017 East Sixth Street in East Austin, in the former home of chocolate shop Maggie Louise Confections.

Pasta|Bar serves a seasonal prix fixe menu of pastas and other Italian dishes. The current menu is 11 courses, several of which are pasta, with items like bone marrow, blue crab with corn and chili, and a tomato salad. The menu is $165 and reservations are currently sold out.

Chefs Phillip Frankland Lee (a Top Chef contestant) and Margarita Kallas-Lee (an Eater Young Gun 2016 semifinalist), opened Pasta|Bar in Los Angeles in June 2020. It earned a Michelin star in 2021. Lee and Kallas-Lee are also the chefs behind Sushi by Scratch Restaurants, formerly known as Sushi|Bar (the current Sushi|Bar in Austin is no longer owned by the couple).

In other news from the married chefs, their other new venture, Sushi by Scratch Restaurants, is now open at the Lost Pines Resort in Cedar Creek, Texas, which is approximately 40 minutes outside of Austin. Reservations for that restaurant are not sold out. They are opening a third restaurant, a high-end omakase restaurant called Shokunin, somewhere in the Hill Country later this summer.

• The Team Behind Wildly Successful Sushi|Bar Is Opening Three New Austin Restaurants [EATX]