Basta

Love this place! Service is always fantastic. The pizza, salads and small plates are always farm fresh and on point. Menu is always changing with the season. Great cocktails! One of my favs in Boulder.

Best pizza ever! Sauce was delicious and thin crust was just perfect. House-​made ice cream was the perfect ending. Wait staff very professional. Even my 12 and 13 year old kids want to return when we come back to Boulder.

Boyfriend took me here for dinner, not much to choose from on the menu. So I ordered pizza and a side of green beans. Pizza was burnt, and green beans were also slightly burnt, very sub par as far as the food selection. No soup, no sandwiches, no pasta except for an $ 82 lasagna. Place looks great on the surface but really lacking as far as food goes in my opinion. The waitress acted shocked when I told her I couldn’t eat the pizza because it was burnt. I felt bad for my poor boyfriend who was embarrassed because I could not eat at this restaurant after he promised me it would be so great.

First off I picked this place off of it’s amazing reviews. I was skeptical however going in. The oysters were sub-​par, they noticed and took them off the bill which was very nice of them. I think they were trying to cook above there ability level. Wait staff was very nice. Did not order the Colorado bass but that did look really good!

An outstanding experience — fantastic service, world-​class appetizers, and some of the best pizza I’ve ever eaten. The décor is modern and rustic without being too pretentious. A must-​visit if you go to Boulder.

We went here in October on a spur of the moment dinner out and had a delightful experience. It was packed late so we had to wait a bit– no problem. The warm hostess set us up at a convenient double duty standing bar where we could eye what came out of the kitchen. We chose to sit at the bar to get seated earlier. Since it was a cooler rainy night, it was a wise choice. Everything in the place that is cooked, is cooked inside the wood fired oven. We had some lovely cocktails and absolutely mouthwatering okra with a bit of spice. I wanted seconds. Even though my pizza was not amazing (see Locale review) as it was not red based, it was tasty, but my partners pepperoni pizza was mind blowing. They had run out of my original choice, the pizza with kale. Technically I should’ve just got the pepperoni as it’s my favorite but I wanted to try a second variety for our first trek here. I got the sausage pizza and it was quite nice but really more like a flatbread starter, not quite up my alley when I’m hankering for pizza. I realize traditional Italian pizza has a wider crust like theirs, but I prefer a pizza that has more toppings/​sauce close to the edge. Other than that, I can’t complain. The kitchen staff/​staff in general were quite personable, they took the time to talk to us and smile, a welcome change for Boulder. The vibe inside was fun, relaxed and bustling.
We ended up ordering dessert, tiramisu. I don’t see it much out anymore, possibly because It was overdone in the 90’s. I Basta is brave enough to put it on their menu. They served us a little cup of their aptly named backyard mint ice cream on the house, outstanding flavor. We will be back.
* We came back in January and didn’t get the same quality of food. I took my rating down from a 4. The pizza seemed less flavorful and was mostly crust this round. The salad had cold potatoes on it, which would have been fine if the flavor balance was there and seasoning was up to snuff, but it tasted raw and bland.
We’ll try again.

Items Tasted:
Apple Shrub
Sea Scallop, Avocado, Blood Orange, Charcoal Mascarpone, Miner’s Lettuce Flowers
Farrotto Piccolo, Hen of the Woods Mushroom, Ricotta Salata, Chive, Tender Leeks
Wood Fired Scratch Lasagna, Domestic Organic Tomato, Stracciatella, Natural Salts, Bechamel, Basta Basil
Duck Confit, Sweet Potato Gnudi, Miner’s Lettuce
Daisy Pizza, Tomato Sauce, Mozzarella, Basil, Olive Oil
Doughnuts, Potato, Goat Cheese, Chantilly, Campfire Vanilla Ice Cream
Owned and Operated by Chef Kelly Whitaker with beverage input by longtime Frasca Food and Wine associate Alan Henkin, Basta was booked largely on the recommendation of a friend who claimed the pizza to be some of the best he had ever tasted and noticing via Social Media that the team had recently visited some of my own personal favorites in Los Angeles an e-​mail was sent to discuss the possibility of a tasting menu, a slow Monday night with snow flurries showing the chefs to be more than willing with results that impressed from beginning to end.
Opened in early 2010, the location in the middle of a residential complex making the unobtrusive storefront a bit tricky to locate for those unfamiliar with the area, it was with winds already gusting and small flakes falling that diners were greeted to doors held open by a staff that proved as educated as they were inviting and offered a choice of tables a two-​top near the front was selected, the menu discussed as a beverage was prepared.
Undoubtedly best known for the pizzas, several offered at Denver’s Cart Driver but here offering a full dining experience including small-​plates and an $ 80 pre-​order Lasagna designed to feed large groups, the space housing Basta stretches long and angular with moody lighting that draws attention to the kitchen and deferring largely to the Chefs save for a few small requests it was with a refreshing shrub in hand that the meal got started, the opening volley of perfectly seared scallops a testament to quality sourcing as well as creativity with avocado offsetting citrus while each bite gained intrigue through the addition of smoked cheese.
Described as an improvised dish that Whitaker «fell in love with» when riffing on Risotto at a past food event course two featured ancient grains in the form of a ‘Farrotto Piccolo’ cylinder with a toothsome base richly imbued with herbs through slow simmering while a mélange of Hen of the Woods Mushrooms joined tender leeks to replicate textures of the famous rice dish, each bite given an added layer of creaminess from Ricotta Salata and a light hint of Chives.
Having mentioned the famous lasagna, it was again through Facebook that I noticed Basta occasionally offered the dish as a daily special offered in smaller parts and inquiring about availability weeks in advance it was with great fortune that the request was not only considered but acted upon, a steamy slice with oozing Bechamel on a serving board offered with stretchy Stracciatella overlying hand crushed Tomatoes and Basil grown in their own garden, the minimalist composition leaving no room for error as the wood oven toasted the top to crisp perfection, each forkful compelling another until not one drop remained.
Feeling the effects of a long day of dining, but at the same time greatly anticipating courses to come, round four delivered crisp duck meat amidst Sweet Potato Gnudi with the leaves of Miner’s Lettuce whose flowers were seen earlier, the follow-​up «Daisy» at this point an embarrassment of riches from which only half was eaten, the Margherita toppings absolutely flawless as the charred crust offered a robust crunch before giving way to the pliable, pocketed and yeasty interior.
Deferring dessert to the kitchen, not brave enough to tackle both bread pudding and donuts before a drive back to Denver in a rental amidst rapidly falling snowflakes, two fried dumplings softened by Potato and Goat Cheese were last delivered with a sidecar of Chantilly, each bite walking a fine line between sweet and savory with an added bonus offered by a scoop of smoky Campfire Vanilla Ice Cream.

A bit hard to find but definitely worth it! They use the freshest ingredients and have great service. The crust was perfect, thin and crispy on the bottom. We had the romaine salad and peppers pizza. Simple yet fantastic!

The Burrata was good, tasted almost gravy-​ish. Brussels sprout was chopped brussels sprouts. They were over cooked, slight burnt taste. Salt seemed like the seasoning of choice for those. I’m sure there was something else present, but I couldn’t taste it. The lamb meat ball had ricotta cheese on it which actually made it have a very dry taste, even though the lamb was well cooked, a juicy medium well. The almond salad atop the meatball added a slight crunch but no significant flavor, just added pretension. The chicken liver mousse was not bad, but the focaccia clashed with the flavor. The cart-​driver pizza had burnt kale and a subpar sausage which was just meh. We got the winter next, which tasted creamy, oniony, with pancetta for a potentially powerful salt/​fat/​carb combo. Unfortunately, this was a little too rich tasting and unbalanced, even with fennel scattered on top. I tried their pepper sauce, which was like a fancy, oil instead of vinegar, tobasco, to try to balance it out, but it was no use. The crust was okay, somewhat like naan, but thinner, kind of chewy, mostly absent and devoid of flavor, so maybe more like a soft matzo. I’m being pretentious in this review, but this restaurant begs pretension and it is the only lens I can truly look at it through. They chose the question and here is the answer. I ended up at a burger restaurant with my friend an hour later and my mouth watered, though I knew I probably shouldn’t.

Love this place! It’s definitely one of the top 3 pizza places in Colorado. (If not the best) It’s worth our drive of nearly 90 minutes each way to go here. On our most recent visit, we were disappointed to arrive and find they were closed for a private party. Alan saw us, came outside to talk to us, and went above and beyond to take care of us anyway. We really appreciate the great service. I’d love if they expanded their hours during the day. The co-​owner/​Chef also opened a pizza restaurant in Denver last year (Cart Driver) which is really good– but Basta is the best!

This place is great when you’re looking for that special place to treat yourself, or just get some really well made food.
The small plates are great for eating family style, and trying all the interesting foods they have to offer.
The half roast chicken is my all time favorite, cooked perfectly each time with a salty skin that balances with the risotto type grain it’s served with.
Also try the doughnuts they have on the dessert menu-​if you have room. They are fresh and served hot.
Overall this place is a great experience every time I go and I can understand why so many people go here and love it!

Well, their food has been excellent before, but this time they quoted 45mins on a pickup order, which is insane, and then the food wasn’t even ready after 45 mins. Then, when I come to pickup the order the restaurant is half empty, so it’s not like the kitchen could be that busy. Plus these are pizzas that cook quickly in a wood oven. There’s no way they could have had a 45 minute time from ordering to eating in the restaurant, so I guess we should have just gone and dined in since the seem to give the shaft to a togo order.

Hands down the best restaurant in Boulder
I’ll start off with drinks, the whiskey daisy & the citrus cobbler are not to be missed! Nick the bartender really knows what he’s doing-​the best bartender in Boulder, & we’ve tried out MANY!
Love their burrata to start, served with fresh baked bread
The pizza’s are amazing, we’ve tried the whole Colorado bass, it was great also & the clams are amazing too, with the lemongrass & calabrian chilies make it delicious!
The doughnuts will change your life
Everything here is cooked in a wood fire oven, pretty impressive! It’s best to make reservations because the place fills up!

We were visiting town for the Bronco game and this restaurant came highly recommended and for good reason. All the dishes are prepared in a wood burning oven. Totally amazing. We enjoyed our entire meal. I have to say the short ribs are heaven on earth. The best meat I’ve ever had. Be sure you save room for the vanilla ice cream and donuts. Kelly and his crew do a fabulous job.

The food is good and we enjoyed the pizza but the service at the bar is downright rude. I’m not sure if the bar tender wth an earring has a chip on his shoulder but it too almost 10 minute for him to acknowledge that we had sat down and then it wasn’t exactly service with a. Smile. Not once did he ask us how our food was or offer to pour other drinks. Stay away from eating at the bar.

I continue to be amazed and impressed by the quality of service. Food continues to be top notch. Our server today, Ben actually remembered us from almost a year ago and such nice person great service. We brought 8 month old and they were very accommodating and high chair was made available. Everyone here is such good attitude and makes very pleasant dining experience. Definitely try to get a reservation here if you can it can be quite busy.

I suspect Basta would be wildly successful serving only pizza, but lucky for its patrons, they serve a number of wood-​fired entrees in addition to their authentic Neapolitan-​style pies. We enjoyed the Daisy (which is a margharita pizza) and the Farrotto Piccolo. This Neapolitan pizza was not only authentic, but also crafted with high quality ingredients — three day fermented dough, rob dinapoli tomatoes, fresh mozzarella and basil. It was really the Farrotto that stole the show with hen-​of-​the-​woods and chanterelle mushrooms and ricotta salata. Just awesome, but I found myself wanting a bit more, especially considering the price tag. Thoughtfully prepared food and stellar service packed into a rustic chic atmosphere made for a fine dining experience.

This place is pretty stellar. I actually had a hard time finding it as its blended in with condos etc. Got a seat right at the bar looking at the wood oven, these chefs are very talented. The food which I had plenty of and couldn’t decide what I wanted as I actually wanted to try it all!
Baratta– absolutely amazing
Chicken liver– well one can never go wrong with that, I ended up polluting some with the Baratta which definitely did not suck!
Lamb meatballs, cooked perfectly and seasoned just right
Finished off with a pizza– I actually don’t remember what kind we ordered because we were going back and forth on the kind but it was perfect. The shell was cooked perfect and left me wanting to go back very soon.

Basta was a tasty treat last night. Coming from NYC and having spent some time in Italy, it’s not the best pizza I’ve ever had, but it was better than just about anywhere else in town.
We had the wood-​fired veggies to start, which were unique and flavorful, although a little bit burnt tasting. A few more of the «croutons» mixed in would have been welcomed.
Our second plate, the Burrata, was by far the best of the three. Creamy mozzarella atop crispy bacon and plump leeks was a great combination alongside the fresh bread that came with.
Our third plate was the cart-​driver pizza. Crust was thin and crispy with plenty of sausage and kale atop. A little dry but overall quite good.
Ambience was cool too. A small, trendy place with nice wood tables and wood-​fired accents throughout. Staff was cordial, polite and friendly, playing with our two-​year old as he explored the whole place.
I’d recommend stoping by and giving it a try.

While both my friend and I agreed the food was good, it was not worth the $ 18 price tag. Maybe for $ 7 it would be «good» but the price was just absurd. Her $ 9 drink came with 80% ice cubes, and not a lot of liquor.
We understand the rent of the space is very high, but for minimal ingredients on a pizza crust, the price is just to high. Especially when both our pizzas came burnt, it was just to expensive.
We also agreed that while our server was friendly, the general service was so slow and laid back. The table next to us made a verbal complaint to their server about the twenty minute wait time for a simple beer, something that we had similar thoughts about.
Nice atmosphere, to overpriced, and poor service. Will not be returning

Outstanding place: we sat at the bar and the bartender was fabulous, food was also top notch. All the staff with the exception of the hostess were very attentive and pleasant. As long as you can get past the hostess the rest of your experience will be great.

Good appetizer we had a variety selection and mist if them were to my taste, pazza was amazing, right balance if ingredients, pronouced flavir and fresh ingredient, i cannit ask for more, service was fast and professional and waitress responded to our request with ease. Wine list is not extensive but of good quality and taste, i would definitely recommend that place and will definitely return again when i am in Boulder area.

Pizza is tasty, but soggy.
Prices are very high — $ 17 for an individual sized pizza? The same pizza downtown is less than $ 10 and a hell of a lot better. By the time you add a beverage, tip and tax, you’re looking at $ 25!

I really like the pizza but it is pricy. $ 16 for a small pizza is a bit much, I would take out so much more often if it was closer to $ 12.

Well, actually, it’s more like 3 ½ stars.
I have visited Basta a couple times, both times with friends.
The first time, we all had wine, pizzas and we loved the atmosphere (on a Saturday night) and the food. We also noticed that the place was very loud, which made it quite difficult to have a conversation, even in a small group.
I think I should aslo mention that Basta is not that obvious to find, the address is on Arapahoe, but the restaurant is actually nested in the middle of the Peloton apartment complex; so you have to park and then walk a little to get there. The second time I went to Basta with a bigger group of friends, some of them had a hard time finding the place, thinking it would be directly on Arapahoe Avenue.
That time, I went for dinner during the week. The place was not full but still very loud, service was surprisingly slow (well, I had to wait for quite a while first to order my cocktail, and even longer to get it, the waitress told me the bartender had 5 more cocktails to do and she was not the least apologetic, even though I had already waited 20 minutes, and once again, the place was far from full).
My cocktail came (finally) with a paper straw, which I think would be cute for a non alcoholic drink (big white and red stripes), but not for the kind of drink I ordered. The consistency of paper softens fairly quickly, which does not make for a pleasant experience.
We all shared various plates and everything was very tasty.
I must mention though that one of the plates listed «raclette» as part of the ingredients (it was also in the name of the dish, name that I forgot). The dish ended up being very good, but there was no raclette cheese in it, just (good) melted cheese. Raclette is a cheese from France or Switzerland. It is also the name of the machine used to melt that cheese (from «racler» wich means to scrape in French). I asked our waitress if the dish was using real raclette cheese, and she enthusiastically replied, yes, it’s very good and made in Vermont. Yes, this dish was good, but I get tired of restaurants using ‘fancy’ names to make their cuisine more appealing (and justify higher prices) when in reality the dish as very little in common with the original meaning. In this case, raclette just meant melted cheese. Please, give a break to your clients, they know more than you think, and if they don’t (I don’t know the specifics of Italian cuisine), don’t take advantage of it!
To end the meal, we shared all 3 desserts offered on the menu and they were all good, my favorite being the Tiramisu.
So overall, the food is very good, prepared with quality ingredients and presented with care, but for the price (most pizzas are around $ 18, I know it’s Boulder, but still…), I expect more attention to service and details (and real raclette if it is mentioned on the menu).

There is a category of restaurants I place in a file called «San Francisco» restaurants. The short few years I lived there the food was amazing. The quality of the dishes were excellent at just about every decent restaurant. And the chefs there know how to cook. Really cook. Basta falls into that category for me. Basta is great. So much of the food here is made in house and everything cooked seems to go through the wood fired oven.
We had a pizza, a whole fish and salad. The fish was cooked perfectly. The skin had a nice char but still edible. The meat was cooked just right. The pizza is pretty much your standard Neapolitan pie. We ordered a romaine salad, which was tossed with olives, roasted tomatoes and capers. This fed 2.5 people (2 adults one 6 year old) perfectly with some pizza slices to go home. Oh and the bread is extra but worth ordering as it’s made in house as well.
Our waitperson was energetic, helpful and attentive all while not being in my face. She didn’t drop a beat from the beginning to finish which is somewhat of a miracle in Boulder.

Hot dern child. This place makes me go SNAP CATS! Such a good menu and staff. You’ll enjoy promise (unless you like terrible food).

Just… wow.
I’ve been a couple times for my Friday pizza and while there may be pizza as good as this in the greater Denver area, there’s certainly nothing that’s any better.
Get the pepperoni. For serious. They get it from some deli in NYC and it’s as near a religious experience as I’ve had in quite some time.
It’s small and the kitchen takes the time to make the food right, so don’t expect to pop in for a quick bite but if you are up for a sit-​down pizza meal in Boulder… hit Basta.

Whoo Hoo! I haven’t given a 5 star review in years! I was beginning to think they went the way of the dodo bird :)
Simply one of the best pies I have had ever and I have lived in NYC and have tried the very best pies across the US in my food adventures.
We started with the Burrata which was a luscious combination of caramelized onions, panceta and melted cheese. It was the perfect app and I thought the highlight of the night. Boy was I wrong!
We followed with a pepperoni pie with oyster mushrooms on red sauce which was fantastic and I had the white pizza with topped with loads of garlic and fresh mozzarella. It was so great. The flavors were balanced and finely done.
So what stood out about the pie that pushed me to 5 stars? good question. I have only given 5 stars to less than a handful of restaurants and I eat out for fun!
1) the service was on point… charming and always present when needed.
2) The entrée was brought to our table at exactly the right time
3) The app was fantastic and the entrée actually was even better.
4) The crust was simply the best crust I remember ever! great bite, beautiful burn from the white oak oven, and I could have eaten a whole crust even without the toppings! Just give me some evo and some fresh parmesn and and I would’ve been happy eating that crispy, wood touched, hot from the oven crust!
5) Toppings were high quality
6) I left with leftover for breakfast and yes I was so yummy x 2. :)
7) Ambiance was great. energy from staff and customers was very positive… smiles all around make a happy place :)
Only con is the noise level was fairly high. They could definitely use some sonic reducing cover on that very cement roof. It was loud.
And frankly we didn’t care cause the food was just so delicious!
If you want to pie done right visit Pizzeria Basta