Tablehopping: Comforts and flavors of Tuscany

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Pizza is always a favorite at Tuscany.

Updated: April 8, 2011 11:36AM

Celebrating 10 years in northwest suburban Wheeling, Tuscany Restaurant continues to be destination for traditional Northern Italian cuisine.

Now with six locations throughout the city and suburbs including along Milwaukee Avenue in Wheeling, Phil Stefani's Tuscany is modeled after the comfortable trattorias of northern Italy featuring homemade pastas, gourmet pizzas baked in wood-burning ovens, fresh seafood, juicy steaks and tender veal.

The Wheeling restaurant has a new look and most recently, a new and improved menu, thanks to Executive Chef Bolla Loza, born in Tuscany, Italy, and now living in Park Ridge.

"We just completed our menu and now it's a larger menu with appetizers, salads and all the main courses," said Bolla, who has worked for Stefani's for more than 28 years. "We changed it completely -- 80 percent of all the dishes are new."

With more than 25 entrees to choose from, guests often select the specialties of the house, the Chilean sea bass toasted with pretzels and served on a bed of butternut squash with a port wine reduction or the popular 24-ounce full Dover sole.

"People come from downtown Chicago just for the Dover Sole," said Bolla, who tries to run it as a special often. "We saute it a white wine with lemon and roasted almonds on top, then serve it tableside with spinach and green beans."

Servers also toss the fresh Tuscany salad tableside, a mix of fresh greens, provolone, hearts of palm, chick peas, olives, sun-dried tomatoes in chunky blue cheese vinaigrette, which is also popular with return customers.

"We want our service to be pleasant," Bolla said. "We get a lot regular customers, two to three times a week."

Some of those regular customers enjoy the wide seafood selection, Bolla said, but also his 16-ounce, bone-in veal chop, pounded, breaded and baked with tomato sauce and mozzarella, served with a side of pasta to his favorite ravioli stuffed with butternut squash and butternut sage.

"Our pasta is not too big and not too small, about 8 to 9 ounces," Bolla said. "On our menu you'll see more meat, like the grilled New York strip steak to more veal, fish and less pasta."

Entree prices run $16 to $34, with the Dover Sole topping out at $40. Daily lunch and dinner specials are also available.

The dining room is expansive, particularly since the large banquette of booths previously down the middle of the dining room has been removed, opening up the room and now seating up to 280 guests comfortably. Three additional and very private rooms can seat anywhere from 30 to 85 guests for private parties. The bar is large and inviting and features an extensive wine list of Italian imports and domestic selections by the glass and bottle.

Tuscany Restaurant

550 S. Milwaukee Ave., Wheeling. Open for lunch, Monday through Friday, 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.; open for dinner, Monday through Thursday, 5-10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 5-11 p.m. and Sunday, 4-9 p.m. (847) 465-9988 or tuscanychicago.com.

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