Fianco

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This Lakeview bistro plays to a neighborhood crowd with a rustic Italian menu and a casual 50-seat dining room with exposed brick walls, butcher paper-covered white tablecloths and sweeping floor-to-ceiling burgundy curtains that divide an otherwise open floor plan into an airy front room and intimate back bar. Chef Matt Troost’s tightly focused menu features fewer than a dozen pasta dishes and entrees, nearly all of which are less than $20. Pastas include hand-made maltagliata (rough cut pasta ribbons) with tomato, basil and ricotta, and sweet pea-ricotta agnolotti (crescent-shaped pockets) with tarragon-butter sauce, mint and parmesan; entrees range from milk-braised, grilled pork to “chicken under a brick,” a half chicken cooked under the weight of a brick to properly crisp the skin before finishing in the oven. Though there’s a full bar, you’ll see most tables drinking wine from the affordable all-Italian list. Brunch is served Saturday and Sunday, and a jazz guitarist sets the mood every Thursday evening.

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Lakeview restaurants, Chicago restaurants, Chicago restaurants, Italian restaurants