Enoteca Vespaio.

Enoteca Vespaio

Enoteca Vespaio was the daytime half of the South Congress Italian pair Alan Lazarus ran, opened next door to Vespaio in 2005 with a long bar beside the dining room and a dessert case facing the sidewalk, and it closed on 9 July 2022 with three days' notice.15

Why go

Vespaio itself followed on 28 February 2026, after twenty-eight years, and took Chapulín Cantina, the Oaxacan room its owners had put in the Enoteca's space, with it.2 Vespaio opened in 1998, dinner only, when South Congress was a quieter street, and the Enoteca was the way to eat the same kitchen's cooking at lunch, at a bar, without the white tablecloths.1 Chef Ryan Samson and general manager Daniel Brooks, who also owns Licha's Cantina, bought both rooms from the founders; CultureMap dated the sale to 2019 when the Enoteca closed and to 2018 when Vespaio did.12 Their statement on the last closure: As South Congress continues to evolve, we felt like this was the right moment to close this chapter on our own terms.2 The same two opened Vespa Rossa in Dripping Springs in the summer of 2025 and say it carries Vespaio's legacy on.2

Order this / avoid

• Order: the bar is gone and so is the kitchen behind it. What the chefs ordered, for the record: Tyson Cole came for the amazing pastas and charcuterie, and in 2011 for the lemon panna cotta.65
• John Lichtenberger's lunch: grilled sardines, and the sandwiches and pasta.7
• The case by the door: house-cured meats, imported cheeses and the pastries, which is how the Chronicle's listing describes what people took away.4
• Avoid: the walk down South Congress for any of it. 1612 is dark and 1610 next door shut with it.2

What locals & experts say

• Three chefs named it on three pages, seven years apart. David Garrido put Enoteca on a short list of four in the Austin Chronicle in 2011, beside Kenichi, Jeffrey's and Uchiko, and Tyson Cole named it on the same page for the panna cotta.5 Cole again, to the James Beard Foundation in 2016, under the heading Quintessential Austin Cooking: Vespaio Enoteca for the amazing pastas and charcuterie.6 John Lichtenberger, to FSR in 2018: I have had amazing grilled sardines here, and the sandwiches and pasta are awesome. We were in for lunch one day, and my wife was excited to see Lyle Lovett come strolling in.7
• CultureMap, July 2022, on what the room was for: the Enoteca reached a daytime crowd, or just one that didn't need a great Italian meal to be a great affair, and in many ways, it felt more true to an authentic Italian dining experience than the dinner room next door.1
• CultureMap, January 2026, on the parent: Vespaio was known throughout its tenure for fresh pasta, a formal-yet-welcoming atmosphere, and elevated comfort food in a town that, until recent years, didn't have much Italian food to speak of.2

Good to know

• Closed on 9 July 2022; the announcement came three days before.1
• Where it was: 1612 South Congress, the door beside Vespaio at 1610, which is the address Raphael Brion filed Chapulín Cantina under when he reviewed the room that replaced it.3
• Hygiene: Austin Public Health's register holds Vespaio at 1610 South Congress, scored 78 and then 90, the second on 19 August 2025, both passes on a scale where 70 fails; that is the restaurant next door. Nothing is on file under 1612 or under the Enoteca's name, which closed before the register's three-year window opens.8
• The Chronicle's listing is flagged Closed.4

Verdict

listed — The wine bar where Tyson Cole ate pasta and charcuterie at lunch became a cantina in 2022, and the cantina and Vespaio both shut in February 2026, so there is no door on South Congress left to send you through; the owners' Vespa Rossa in Dripping Springs is where that kitchen's cooks went.