It's been 3 years since Flour + Water first opened its doors, and the restaurant is still going strong.
Flour + Water was recently named one of the Best Italian Restaurants in the U.S. by Travel + Leisure and there are few folks, if any, that would disagree with that.
The chef and partner, Thomas McNaughton, trained and worked at top notch restaurants in Europe and San Francisco (Gary Danko and Quince) before opening Flour + Water. He also trained at a pasta 'laboratory' in Italy to learn how to perfect the art of pasta making.
Their Neopolitan style wood fired pizzas are excellent, but their main focus is pasta and they do an outstanding job of it. A 7-course pasta tasting menu is available for $65 if you want to sample their different hand crafted pasta dishes.
Corn Tortelloni with Prosciutto and Chives
Don't understimate the amount of effort put into the planning of their pasta dishes. They are really well thought out, with each type of pasta perfectly complementing the sauce it is paired with. Their menu changes often but their agnolotti dal plin is a classic favorite, and their cappellacci dei briganti is a nice ode to the forgotten Italian brigands that existed until the mid 19th century.
Cappellacci Dei Briganti with Goat Sausage, Rabe & Aleppo Pepper
Proscuitto Pizza with Summer Squash, Thyme, Lemon & Fior de Latte
Melon & Grape Salad with Pickled Shallots, Fresh Tarragon and Olive Sea Salt
Wood Oven Roasted Butter Beans with Padron Peppers, Lardo & Bread Crumbs
If you want to learn more about different pasta shapes and what sauces they pair well with, check out The Geometry of Pasta. If you're at the restaurant, ask to see their copy while you wait for your meal.
Earlier in the Spring, the partners of Flour + Water opened up Central Kitchen (California cuisine) and Salumeria in the same Mission District area.
Flour + Water
2401 Harrison Street
San Francisco, California, USA
Telephone: 415-826-7000
CK, being the mushroom lover, ordered the wild mushroom pizza. Served with the mushrooms were tallegio cheese, Ingersoll fiore di latte mozzarella, and herbs. This pizza had a very strong mushroom taste. For a pizza topping, I prefer the button mushroom over a wild mushroom.
After the pizzas, I was craving a salad so I ordered the Cookstown Greens with shaved fennel, and Champagne vinaigrette. This was a very refreshing salad.
One of the charms to eating Neapolitan pizza is the charred dough and crust. This was my napkin after eating my pizza. 
Libretto does not accept reservations (unless you are a party of 8 or more), so be prepared to wait in line on weekends, especially if you are a party of 3 or more. Luckily, we were only two people. Some of the bigger groups originally waiting with us in line were still waiting by the time we finished our meal.
Our meal started with the long awaited caprese salad. The salad was not quite what I expected, but it was partly my fault because I should have read the menu clearly. Instead of the straight traditional tomato, basil, and bocconcini, it was a green salad served with tomato, bocconcini, and basil. The one bad thing about winter in Ottawa is that a lot of fruits and veggies are not in season. The tomatoes in the salad were tasteless, and the basil was chopped up and marinated in oil. I was somewhat disappointed with this.
For our main meal, P and I split the pastore pizza: a thin crust pizza topped with artichoke hearts, roasted red pepper, sun-dried tomatoes, basil & goat cheese. We were also craving pancetta, so we added it as an additional topping. The toppings were really fresh but the pizza dough was a little dry.
After lunch, we continued to walk around the market to finish up our holiday shopping.
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