A short walk around the corner brought us to Torc Napa, for what would be not just the best dinner of the trip, but one of the best meals I’ve ever had. Chef and owner Sean O’Toole came to the table after we sat down and told us not to order anything. He would be handling our menu, and his wife and business partner, Cynthia, would handle our wine pairings.
D Magazine
Napa Valley Register Reader's Choice: Best Fine Dining Napa Valley Restaurant 2019
The Napa Valley is famous for its wines, but its restaurants come in a close second. What better way to enjoy the wines than to pair them with meals served up by world-renowned chefs and culinary teams?
But with all the places to eat up and down the Napa Valley, how do you decide where to eat? There are too many options.
Napa Valley Register readers were polled online in August to vote for their favorite restaurants, and here is what they recommend.
Naturally, Danny Seo
In an airy space with lots of natural light streaming in from the floor-to-ceiling front windows, TORC has both a hip, buzzy vibe and a relaxed atmosphere with friendly, unpretentious service. The energy emanates from the open kitchen, where Chef Sean O’Toole and his team prepare fresh, farm-to-table fare with a global influence. O’Toole builds his dishes around one key ingredient, like the vegan chilled pea soup with Bellwether Farms ricotta cheese, croutons, and goa black spice, which was as delicious as it was beautifully plated.
Vie Magazine
TORC, in downtown Napa, serves an eclectic menu of contemporary American cuisine. Chef Sean O’Toole rotates dishes often and features local producers whenever possible. My favorites included his Japanese hamachi crudo—served with winter citrus, yuzu kosho, coriander, and forbidden rice—and the akaushi beef short rib—served with winter root vegetables, potato boulangère, and horseradish.
Charlotte Magazine
WHEN THE SMALL PLATES arrive to our prime table at the front of TORC’s dining room in downtown Napa, I’m relieved when I can taste the food delicately placed on the white china. After two full days of wine tastings, my palate is exhausted from sips of bold cabernet sauvignon and bites of creamy cheese. My senses have been overwhelmed by the lush valley and the crisp air, floral and grassy with the promise of spring. The blood orange sunset outside streams through the restaurant’s windows and spotlights our table.
Napa Valley is home to roughly 500 wineries, and as first-time visitors, my girlfriend and I have been in a state of sensory overload since we arrived. Luckily, our mid-March trip places us in wine country outside of the peak harvest season (August through October), leaving us little competition for space in the tasting rooms and restaurants. They were busy, but not packed, and we rarely had trouble making reservations. We had space to linger, to snap photos and spread out on sun-flooded patios.
Wine Enthusiast
In the heart of wine country, this restaurant has a serious but accessible wine program to serve both connoisseurs and casual wine drinkers. The ever-growing list has an emphasis on Californian wines, including a large selection of back-vintage Napa Cabernet, to complement the locally sourced food.
From the Sommelier: “Being in the heart of Napa Valley’s wine country is truly an amazing place to be as a restaurateur and a wine director, especially after the recent fires. It’s such an amazing community – one that supports and learns from each other. On any given night we have some of the most amazing wine luminaries dining with us. You can’t help but be inspired.” —Cynthia O’Toole, Torc
Dish We Loved: Akaushi beef short rib with potato boulangère, artichoke, sugar snap peas, and Napa cabernet glaze
Edible Sacramento
The next evening, we dined at TORC in Napa. The high-energy restaurant serves stellar contemporary American cuisine. Chef/owner Sean O’Toole changes the menu frequently and highlights the bounty of Napa’s local farmers and ranchers. He is a huge fan of mushrooms, so you will find many varieties of seasonal — and sometimes locally foraged — fungi in his dishes. Exceptional, protein-rich choices are abundant (wild Bodega Bay king salmon, heritage pork belly, prime dry-aged New York strip), but it’s the attention to detail with his vegetable dishes that made me long to return soon, including the chu-chu eggplant with burrata gratin, Aleppo pepper, and spearmint, and Iacopi Farms (in Half Moon Bay) English peas à la française, with little gem butter-leaf lettuce and Nantes carrots.
The Baltimore Sun
Those traveling in a group should head to Torc, the contemporary restaurant nestled in the heart of Napa Valley and owned by Chef Sean O'Toole and his wife, Cynthia O'Toole. The space — a mammoth open dinning room with additional second-floor seating — is always bustling. And for good reason; the food is spectacular, with offerings in a variety of price ranges. Groups can call in advance and order off-menu family-style plates to share, including whole braised 12- to 15-pound beef shank with black perigord truffles for 10 (pre-order for $275); whole roasted halibut tail for four (pre-order for $125); 6-pound lobster Thermidor for four (pre-order for $155), and dry-aged bone-in rib eye (available nightly for $165). There’s also a nightly three-course prix-fixe menu for $46 per person plus $18 for wine pairings. And the daily happy hour, served at the bar until 6:30 p.m., offers an array of hearty, tasty bites including the Bengali sweet potato pakora for $5, $4 beers, and $6 glasses of wine and cocktails.
Wine & Spirits
At Torc, husband and wife duo Sean and Cynthia O’Toole offer the truffles and blue-chip wines of a fine-dining destination without the pomp and hush. Come for handmade pastas, locally raised heritage meats, and vegetable sides featuring produce grown at neighboring farms or foraged by Sean himself. Then settle in to take advantage of Cynthia’s wine list, deep in library vintages of seminal Napa wines like Dominus, and in Old World wine-trade favorites like Allemand Cornas. With a rock n’ roll playlist and a sweeping brick-and-wood room, the space is as welcoming for a quick glass of Vouvray and a bite of crudo at the bar as it is for a full-fledged feast.