Lucio's Italian Restaurant

Eating at this restaurant makes you feel part of history just like the paintings surrounding you on all walls. I loved the zucchini flowers fritters, light and tasty. The pasta dishes were both outstanding but the ink squid fazzoletti were our favorites. Staff is very friendly and they tend to leave you alone so that you have time to enjoy the whole experience. Overall, it's a great Italian restaurant with authentic cuisine. I've seen a few negative reviews but you can easily tell that they fake as the profile has only a handful of reviews but I have to commend Sally on handling very well the negative feedback and providing factual information to address it with class. Well done on that as well!

We celebrated our anniversary at Lucio, it was an amazing experience. The food was absolutely divine, from entrée to desserts. Restaurant is quite artistic, bright and vibrant. The service was great, staff were friendly. We would definitely go back. Highly recommended.

What a beautiful experience. A meal at Lucio’s is always special regardless of the occasion, in this case a family lunch for my daughter’s birthday. The entire table of 7 loved every bite, and the service (fine dining but friendly and welcoming) and the gorgeous, art-adorned space topped it off. We will always return to Lucio’s, an evergreen classic that stays true to its heritage while remaining fresh and modern.

I had team lunch recently with a few friends at this old establishment at Paddington before Christmas holiday. The ambience of the place is good and the restaurant has a good vibe, wall decoration and bright sunlight inside. The service from floor staff is generally good and efficient, but too bad they forgot to put a steak knife for my grilled veal which is an amateur mistake for a fine-dining establishment like this one. I've tried 3-courses menu and they're all mostly good. The special dishes for me were the ravioli of ricotta and wakame and the pistachio creme brulee. I've tried some cannoli from my friend's plate and they're not my favorite since the pastry was a bit too crumbly and the white chocolate taste overwhelmed the ricotta.

Had a craving for pasta and made a lunchtime booking online during the week. The food quality was very good and so was the coffee. However, with only two staff on the day, we waited 15-20 minutes before we even got the menu.

A Sydney Italian institution in a quiet and pretty part of Paddington. My husband took to Lucio's for my birthday treat, and it's a classic, timeless restaurant with beautiful quality food and wine. We had the phenomenal NZ Chardonnay, which went perfectly with our appetizers and mains, and finished with a beautiful Muscat to accompany dessert and petite fours. Staff are knowledgeable and service is friendly, plus the various artwork on the wall adds to its charm and character. Definitely be sure to include Lucio's to your Sydney 'must-try' restaurant list!

Excellent service and definitely one of the best Italian restaurants in Sydney. The Two Hat recognition did not disappoint. The best thing is that they're trying new stuff, so not just giving you traditional Italian dishes. My favourite dishes of the night were their wakame ravioli with crispy native salt bush and burnt butter, the marron risotto and the lemon panna cotta with lime sorbet and watermelon granita. The only thing that I would comment is the bread. It was stale and very hard to bite into and the butter was hard and cold and haven't been given enough time for it to soften. Given there are many restaurants out there that start their service with amazing, warm, freshly baked bread and home made butter, it will be good if they could have at least sourced better bread and butter and at least warmed up the bread prior to service. Other than that, everything was great and will come again. Bonus: it's relatively quiet as well

Incredible Italian food with authentique friendly service. The prawns and octopus are a must try!! Or just try everything, it's all great...

Mama Mia non ci credo its a beautiful setting with lots of artwork on the wall. For a Friday night early bird dinner it was a pleasant experience. it's a bit pricey but as you expect to pay for fine dining. it gave me inspiration to travel throughout Italy places like Florence Tuscany Venice & Rome. The anecdote is the food of course paired with a nice glass of wine.

Has always been my favourite restaurant in Sydney, amazing Italian food that is always fresh, delicious and flavourful. The staff are fantastic and the environment is perfect. I had my 18th birthday family lunch there and I have the best memories from that day thanks to Lucio's.

Great local Italian restaurant. The food is delicious and authentic, and the staff here are so welcoming and friendly. The only downside is that it is a little bit pricey, so depends on how much you want to spend.

I always set a higher standard when it comes to the more expensive restaurants in Sydney - and yes, this may be a little unfair, but if you're going to raise the stakes with price, I am going to judge your eatery with a little more finesse. Firstly, Lucios' is beautifully positioned in the heart of Paddington suburbia - finding this special little building is in itself a gift. The interiors of Lucios is what it is more famous for - the walls hold a collection of some of Australias top artists - consider yourself sitting in an art gallery with a few million dollars worths of paintings to gaze at. The wine collection is extensive, with a wonderful range of both Italian and Australian bottles represented. My suggestion is save some space for the dessert wines - they're like drinking liquid honey - a luxurious taste sensation - truly worthwhile... Now, onto food - and I'm being honest with you because I want you to have the best dining experience - I would say "meh"... It's ok - the food is nice - but does it warrant the $30 entree and $50 main price tag - absolutely NOT. I had the Kingifish Carpaccio which was beautifully presented. A bell jar lifts off the food and the smokey flavour is meant to saturate the taste - it did, kind of - but in many ways I think it delivered more of a show than a taste sensation. Fish of the day was good - firm fish, minimal vegetable - good, but not excellent. Would I suggest you go to Lucios? Maybe if you've got money to drop... but if its a special occasion that you've been saving for then I think there are much better places to spend your hard earned cash. Staff are friendly - attentive and hardworking - my only criticism was they were too attentive and didn't give us much room for privacy - sometimes you want to be left alone... I hope this review offers you some guidance...

Outstanding Italian food. We had the black handkerchief pasta and the tagliolini with blue swimmer crab for our entrees; the spatchcock and the lamb for our mains; and the assaggi tasting plate for dessert. Everything was superb. The vibe here is very laid-back and family-friendly. Seems like a good place to come if you have young children in tow but still want to eat somewhere classy.

I'd been pining for this place for years but never quite got around to putting my bum on the seat, until the night before I left Sydney to move to Italy for a year and my friends brought me here as a surprise. And it didn't disappoint. I've since been back a number of times, each visit as excellent as the last. This place opened almost 30 years ago before I was even born and has since earned a pretty damn good reputation for northern Italian cuisine. The beetroot-cured kingfish with avocado puree is bliss to start, and for mains I'd recommend the risotto with prawns and lemon, or my all-time favourite, the baslasmic-roasted duck with caramelised witlof, peas and blood limes. And of course, you can't have an Italian meal without dessert - so spoon into Lucio's home-made vanilla ice-cream with hot espresso coffee and a shot of amaretto.

This is my favourite restaurant in Sydney. I've been with work colleagues or friends a number of times over the last couple of months and it has always been top notch. One friend is a wine connoisseur and he found the selection fantastic. Another is gluten free and the waiter was well informed and solicitous in helping her. Each time we had a marvellous evening. Highly recommended.

Superb food and service makes this restaurant a Sydney institution. The art collection is also amazing.

Me and my wife have been for the first time to this restaurant because we are Italians and enjoy tasting different regional cuisines from Italy. We saw good reviews on the Sydney Morning Herald's Good Food Guide (2 hats) and we had high expectations form this restaurant. Unfortunately we had the worst dining experience of our life because of the owner incredible arrogance and total lack of customer orientation. We were sitting in a corner and my wife made me notice that someone from the kitchen little window was frequently and persistently staring at her. At the end of the dinner I told the waiter about the uncomfortable situation and kindly asked whether it was possible to do something about it. The waiter was quite understanding and informed the Manager Lucio Galletto who, apparently, is also the actual owner; Mr Galletto, instead of finding out whether the issue was true or not and addressing the situation, started to defend the employee (probably the Chef Logan Campbell) "a priori" raising his voice with us in front of all other customers like if we were the ones who were mistaken. He was trying to argue, once again without even finding out what happened from us or the people in the kitchen, that the employee was not looking at us and that - paradoxically - it was me that I was staring at him at that moment. We could not believe how arrogant and rude he was to respond to our complaint that way in front of all other customers. Certainly not a 2 hat restaurant customer treatment or orientation. After that, we felt treated by Lucio Galletto like we were not welcome there and he did not need our business. I believe that when a restaurant owner becomes so arrogant that does not even take into consideration his customers needs/concerns and prefers to defend no matter what his employees' undefendable and uncomfortable behaviours, that restaurant does not deserve so many accolades. We have also been to Buon Ricordo, Beppi and Pilu at Freshwater in the past and their food was also better than Lucio's. I wonder what criteria the Sydney Morning Herald's Good Food Guide reviewers apply to appraise restaurants and give hats. We have been to no hat restaurants where the owner or manager was much more willing to accommodate our much less significant issues. Unfortunately Mr Lucio Galletto, being in business since the '80s, has probably developped an arrongant attitude towards unhappy customers and insensitivity to serious customers complaints. It is a pity for the reputation of Italian Restaurants in Sydney, that he, as president of the Council of Italian Restaurants in Australia, is supposed to represent ...