Cento Pasta Bar

On our lists of the best romantic restaurants and cozy restaurants in Los Angeles.

Counter seats face the open kitchen in the middle of this West Adams pasta bar, and the courtyard outside is the quieter place to talk, since the music inside runs loud. It started in 2015 as a lunchtime pop-up inside Mignon, a downtown wine bar, before getting a room of its own on Adams Boulevard. Pasta carries the menu: spicy pomodoro rigatoni with ricotta, beet spaghetti with brown butter and poppy seed. Grilled orata, hamachi crudo and a banana-pudding tiramisu fill it out, and there's a cocktail list at the bar.