Lit Italian Wine Bar

Great wine selection! Love the Kung Foo Girl white riesling. They give popcorn with your drinks which is a unique and fun replacement of the usual bar nuts. The Stuzzuchini is my go to meal every time I visit.

It’s a mid priced Italian restaurant, quiet and relaxing (and very dark)…that serves wine. There is nothing that I could see that makes it a «wine bar». The server did not make suggestions for pairing and didn’t offer any info on the wine we ordered. We started with a white with appies and couldn’t find a server to order a second glass of red to now go with our meals until we were halfway through our meal. and it wasn’t even busy. Food was fine for Italian.

I went to Lit last night for a birthday dinner with myself and 9 family members. Our service was absolutely terrible. Our server was extremely busy and the manager seemed like he was very busy chatting up a few particular tables to help her out. Our drinks were empty more often than not, we were unable to ask the server for refills because she just never came back to the table.
After waiting a good half hour, she came and got our orders however they were out of many items on the menu so most of us didn’t get what we wanted to eat. One person said he needed a couple minutes to decide what he wanted since they were out of his first choice and she never ended up coming back to get his order. Eventually we got up to track her down to order his meal and to ask for some drinks. The food finally started arriving more than 45 minutes after we ordered and appetizers were coming out after entrees and then we started learning that some of the stuff we ordered wasn’t available so we had to make more substitutions. They served me the wrong dish and so they went back to make the proper one so everyone was finished with their meals by the time I started on mine, which turned out to be awful. The manager bought us a free round of shots, however most of the people at our table were driving and couldn’t enjoy them anyways. It was to the point that the server was afraid to ask us how our meals were (and she didn’t).
I asked to speak to the manager and he was extremely rude and blamed our bad experience all on the kitchen, which I thought was extremely unfair. He refused to take the mandatory 18% gratuity off the bill because he didn’t want his server to lose money for «kitchen mistakes» and because he’d bought us a round of shots so he had made up for everything that had gone wrong. He ended up instead giving us 20% off the bill after I insisted (so he «saved» us 2% in the end).
I will never return to this restaurant and I strongly suggest that if you’re going with a group to have a nice dinner that this not be one of your options. I have seen good reviews with respect to going for wine and tapas so maybe that’s their strength, but I certainly was not pleased with our service and how we were treated by management.

Situated in the midst of Edmonton’s increasingly popular 104 street strip, Lit Italian Wine Bar’s chic, sophisticated interior is a delightfully ambient complement to their excellent wine selection and mouth-​watering tapas menu.
During my visit, I was treated to the comic wit of a friendly and personable waiter, who gave me some very honest wine suggestions. With the restaurant being out of the malbec, I opted for the tempranillo, which was every bit as good as he suggested. While I waited for my guests, I snacked on Lit’s complimentary popcorn — a nice touch, even if it does make you drink more.
For dinner, we chose a variety of plates to share, starting with olives and moving onto the antipasto board, the stuzzichini (a selection of calamari, spreads, and meats), the bizmark pizza (prosciutto, arugula, asiago, and eggs), and the parm frites (fries covered in parmesan that melt in your mouth).
Everything was unbelievably delicious and fresh (although I can’t speak for the calamari, which I avoid at all costs). My favourites for the night were the prosciutto-​wrapped bocconcini and arugula (from the antipasto), the olive tapenade (from the antipasto and the stuzzichini), and the parm frites. Much like The Marc’s Frites with Truffle Aioli, Lit’s French fry dish is a savoury, addicting appetizer that will tickle your taste buds and maybe just induce you to eat the entire thing.
So far, I’ve had nothing negative to say about this restaurant. The food was great, the wine extremely drinkable (perhaps a little too much so), and the service friendly, funny, and attentive. Will the prices, however, bring the restaurant down a notch?
I wouldn’t say so. Lit isn’t the cheapest restaurant on the block, but — as I always say, when it’s true — the price is worth it. What you may pay for an entrée at one restaurant will be enough to get you one tapas plate from Lit. It’s worth it, though, if you enjoy fine Italian dishes and a great selection of the very best (reasonably-​priced) wines. And, if you do as we did and go as a group, it doesn’t turn out to be that bad, averaging at about $ 50 a person for a variety of foods and a number of drinks (each).
So, yes. Do it. Get over to Lit. And, if you’re a red wine drinker like myself, do yourself a favour and order a half-​litre of the tempranillo. Your palate will thank you.

Lit is okay. They have a great location and the décor is alright, but it’s nothing to write home about. Write to Unilocal though, yes.
I went to Lit a few months ago to reconnect with a friend who had just moved back to Alberta, and it’s a nice spot to just sit and relax without being bombarded by loud music and loads of people. The food was okay and the wine was great, but my three stars is primarily because of the service. Our server seemed completely disinterested in helping anyone, let alone giving suggestions on wine pairings.
I haven’t written off Lit entirely though because of that one visit, as it does seem like they have potential.

Lit has steadily improved over the last several months. I’ve dropped by for a drink or a bite many times, and I’ve always had great service and a comfortable atmosphere. The food is good Italian fare with some variations. Complimentary garlic popcorn is typically provided, which is certainly a major highlight of coming by for a glass of wine or a beer. There are a couple aspects I am not crazy about for this place, but overall I would like to rate it between 4 and 5 stars.
Food
I wouldn’t come here for the express intention of having dinner necessarily, but the food I have tried has all impressed me. The bacon wrapped boccocini, the calamari, the pizzas and the pastas are all quite good. I also have stopped by a few times at lunch, where they offer 3 dishes at 5 dollars each. I can really say that it’s always been reliable and satisfying. The food hasn’t blown my mind or anything, but it’s been great overall.
Service
I came here often enough to have gotten to know the bartenders and servers a little bit. They’re all really nice people and I’ve had lots of friendly conversations with them, as well as the owner. Any time employees are willing to engage their customers and build a community, it’s a good thing. To complement that, the service is efficient and professional.
Atmosphere
It’s comfortable and laid back. I have usually been there on weeknights when it isn’t too busy and it’s a great to relax. On most Thursday nights I believe they host live musicians, and it’s a lot more energetic on the weekend. There are some tables outside that are really lovely to sit at in the evening or at lunch.
Overall this place has become a little favorite of mine. If I could suggest one thing I think it needs the most, it would some specials on food or drinks throughout the week. A lot of other wine bars and establishments in the area offer half price wine nights or other deals, I think this would attract more people and would certainly make me happy!

I went to Lit with a girlfriend to have a drink and share a few plates. I was beyond happy to get complimentary popcorn. It was delicious. We ordered the parm frites, backed boccocini, and the spicy meatballs. The portion for the fries was huge, and they were just okay. Same thing with the bake boccocini. It was okay. The meatballs were very very overcooked. So overcooked that we couldn’t even finish eating them. However the sauce for the meatballs was very good. We dipped the crostini in the sauces after ward. The service was pretty slow, especially considering that we were there very early and the only ones there.
I would still maybe go back to try some different dishes. I will definitely go back to have more of the popcorn, which was by far the best part.

I came to Lit for the first time last night with two girlfriends. We had just left a Unilocal Elite Event at the EyeCare Group and didn’t want the fabulous night to be over.
With a trendy lit up entrance and awesome live jazz blasting out the front door by a funky piano playing songstress, we were immediately lured in. (Think Sublime & the Fugees gone funky jazz!)
We were quickly seated at the only available table — Yay!
The music was a little loud for my liking and my voice is hoarse this morning from trying to talk with my girlfriends.
Unfortunately, the music was the highlight of our evening a Lit; But I digress…
We were greeted by our server, Jess, within a few minutes. Between the sheer volume of music and it being our first visit to Lit, we needed a little more time.
After finally decided, we ordered a pizza and an appetizer plate to share:
Bizmark Pizza $ 16
garlic butter, prosciutto, arugula, asiago, 2 soft eggs
Appetizer plate that isn’t listed on their menu so I don’t have the exact description but it was calamari, baked bocconcini, and breaded risotto. $ 15
I inquired with my server if the sangria was a good choice and she noted that it was. So I ordered Sangria and water, my gf a glass of red wine, and the dd had water.
Our beverages arrived a few minutes later and my sangria was absolutely horrid. Maybe it just wan’t the right red wine base for me but I did not like it at all. I couldn’t even force myself to sip it. So I drank my glass of water instead and waited and waited… About 15 minutes later our food arrived. I again waited. Our server didn’t notice that my drink was still 100% full and also did not come back to ask how we liked our choices. About 5 minutes later, I called to our server and asked her to take the sangria away. She didn’t ask if I would like to order something in its place — just took it away and didn’t come back.
About 30 minutes later she picked up our dishes and had never asked if we needed anything. I eventually walked over to the bartender to ask for more water.
When we initially ordered our food, I inquired if the desserts were shareable or single servings — she had said they were shareable and I indicated I was interested in the tiramisu.
Well, she never returned. So we put on our coats and sat at the table another 15 minutes before again walking up to the bar to ask for the bill.
To her credit, the sangria was taken off my bill and she did tell me she would have it taken off — but that should be standard practice.
With regards to the food, the complimentary truffle popcorn was nice BUT some of our popcorn was burnt. Yep, that’s right — burnt popcorn. The appetizer plate was good — the calamari was cooked to perfection. The baked bocconcini was good but nothing to write home about — wrapped in prosciutto with a pesto drizzle. The breaded risotto was good — but again nothing to write home about. The portions were small but that’s not a deal breaker me. It was obvious the food was cooked with love but I would only repeat the calamari again; that being said, I do not intend to return.
The pizza was fairly bland and parts of the thing dough were overcooked and almost crunchy. I LOVE LOVE LOVE a good arugula and prosciutto pizza so don’t get me wrong — this one was not as good as the one Famoso offers at all of their locations. I did enjoy the over easy egg on top — it gave it a surprisingly creamy texture and taste.
I uploaded pictures of the «lit» bar as well as our food items — so take a peek!
Again, the atmosphere was great — the music superber (but too loud) but the food and, most importantly, the service will not have me wanting to come back.
2 stars for me based upon the atmosphere and music. If it were based solely on the food and service, I’d be leaning towards 1.5.
PS — As a total aside, Liv’s picture of the same appetizer plate had nearly double the food we had and another item! Her picture shows bruschetta and 3 of the breaded risotto balls and three calamari and rather than the two we received… Hmm… Interesting. Even for $ 2 or $ 3 more it would have certainly seemed like more food to have a couple slices of bruschetta.
PPS — In looking at my photos of the menu I took in order to recap the ingredients and prices for you, the menus are filthy dirty :-(Big pet peeve of mine!

If I was looking for a romantic date, Lit would be top of my list, but since I don’t do the lovey-​dovey stuff I find it somewhat of a bore. Dark, intimate and Italian, this is a perfect place for romance. However, the past two times I’ve been here was for drinks with friends. Food and wine are delicious, but I found the portions and pours somewhat small for the accompanying pricetag. Servers are attentive, but venue has also been near-​empty when I’ve visited. I won’t say no to going back, but Lit doesn’t come first to mind when someone asks where to dine in Edmonton. I’d like to see them turn it up a notch and inject some life into this place, since location and menu are so promising. Bring me back, Lit!

Yowch. I am loathe to write such a negative review, but my experience was less than satisfactory. I stopped in with a friend for some wine and food. We loved the wine — Sartori Pinot Grigio — but the food left us cold. The tomatoes in the Caprese Salad were so unripe that they were crunchy. Beef Carpaccio had evidently been cut from a frozen piece of meat; the slices were unpleasantly cold and contained ice crystals that melted on my tongue. Prosciutto-​wrapped bocconcini sounded so good on paper, but the proscuitto wrap didn’t even taste like proscuitto. It tasted like bacon fat and not in a good way. Granted, our server was excellent but I was thoroughly, thoroughly, disappointed in the food.

Lit-​erally one of the cutest wine bars in the city and a perfect 104^th Street hot spot. This Italian style wine bar is always packed and buzzing. Although, it is hard not to be busy in a place that is so, in a word, Lit-​tle. With seating for around 30, not the most comfortable in the world, mind you, it does well to have a reservation if you are going to be a guest. The Italian menu reads like Lit-​erature (I know, I couldn’t help it!), sparkling with Italian classics such as antipastos, olives, flat breads and pastas. The wine list is excellent as well, as one would expect from a venue de vino. The deconstructed environment is sparsely decorated with a few paintings and Lit-​hographs (I swear, that is the last one) by local artists.
So go fall in love with Lit. What can I say… sometimes, it’s all in the name!

Popcorn is an almost perfect accompaniment to wine and adds playfulness to a serious menu (is complementary popcorn becoming a trend in wine and cocktail bars?). I had visited Lit once before for a quick street-​side lunch, but didn’t have a chance to appreciate what this bar really had to offer. This isn’t to say that my fresh caprese salad ($ 10) and Cabernet Sauvignon ($ 10) on a sunny sidewalk watching the hustle of the 104 street farmers market isn’t enough to award the place four stars. But I was pleased that an evening inside Lit demonstrated that this place does almost everything well. Including complementary popcorn.
Lit is small and intimate, but not cramped like Tzin across the street. High ceilings and spaced tables. This place is modern.
And very friendly service: not even all the way through the door, when I arrived I was immediately waved to the bar by the server like an old friend. But, I discovered, we had never met before. No matter. I was seated at a table by the window and our server’s attentiveness continued throughout the night keeping our glasses full, table cleared, and recommendation flowing.
My friend and I shared a mushroom pizza (mushrooms, garlic butter, parmigiano, pine nuts) and plenty of wine. For $ 14 the pizza wasn’t large, but it was packed full of flavour. The crust was very thin and very crispy – to die for. The toppings weren’t heaping like at Famoso which makes for a soggy pie, but they weren’t sparse like at Leva. As Italian type pizza goes (as opposed to the Chicago deep-​dish variety, which really is a completely different food group) this pizza was honestly the best pizza I’ve had in Edmonton.
We finished with a Tiramisu. A substantial portion but possibly the lightest I’ve ever had.
My only complaint is that there are no half glasses of wine available – a trend I’ve seen in Calgary but that hasn’t much caught on up in Edmonton.

I always consider the sanitation and hygiene of an establishment primary. Lit is an example of a facility where you must look at the structure and hygiene of the employees, particularly if you can’t get a peek at the kitchen. First, the entrance to Lit is supremely disgusting (note the photos) and second two staff members were smoking outside of Lit and without hesitation both threw their filthy butts on the ground. The two staff members then headed right back into Lit and amazingly they did not wash their hands. Just plain disgusting!
I just do not understand why these facilities are ever patronized even if the food is good. The menu ought to reflect the poor hygiene of the employees:
A side of prosciutto with a heavy nicotine embellishment.
Staph aureus served with salad greens of your choice.

By fluke I had lunch at Lit Italian Wine Bar. First, I love this downtown area. There are some many shops to peruse and such a great outdoor café scene!
My diet these days is pretty strict. Gluten free-​vegetarian you would think makes dining out difficult. Surprisingly not the case. I am discovering that most restaurants now have gluten free options.
Sine it was lunch time, and the sun was out shining, and there happen to be a table available outside, my lunch date and I opted for salads!
I had the caprese salad and my date had the ahi tuna salad. The caprese salad had a beautiful blend of juicy red and yellow tomatoes with fresh basil and bococcini and the most flavourful olive oil I had ever tasted! It was the perfect size and was so satisfying!
The tuna salad had beautiful lightly seared tuna medallions with greens and raspberries. We were also given complimentary popcorn too!
They do have gluten free pasta as an option for their pasta dishes.
The place is small yet perfectly laid out and situated downtown. The service was pleasant and quick and the price was RIGHT! I would definitely go again and recommend this place for a nice outdoor lunch, after work wine, or weekend relaxing!

I enjoyed Lit, the atmosphere was very quaint as with all other things on 104^th street. In fact I would say that 104^th street is basically it’s own little sub division of Edmonton. It reminds me of a short story I read in Junior High called Rue de la Bouteille Vert (or Green bottle street). Regardless, I tend to love everything on 104^th street. Lit has a wonderful selection of wine, definitely some that even I have never heard of. They have a small menu but everything I tried was delicious. My dish was a traditional Ukrainian dish and was actually prepared with a raw egg. The pasta was so hot that when they put the egg yolk in the pasta (yes it was in front of us) and stirred it in it cooked right in and became part of the pre-​existing sauce. I was a little turned off at first but it ended up being delicious! The service was pretty good, although our server was a little odd she ended up giving us a free sample of their new holiday drink! The desserts were wonderful as well. I had the inside out Ferrero Roche chocolate with ice cream. All in all I had a grab experience here and would definitely recommend the highly chic, upscale atmosphere. This wine bar would definitely be a great place to take your girlfriends for drinks!

I think Lit is just what Edmonton has been missing. As another 104^th Street biz review mentions, these cool spots along this strip make you feel like Edmonton is getting cooler. Lit is no exception.
Grab a seat at one of the cozy booths or along the bar downstairs, or go upstairs to feel even cooler.
I’ve found the staff here to be consistently friendly and the service to be good. (Though I should note, I haven’t been here on a busy Friday or Saturday night.)
It’s a great, classy little place with an excellent selection of wines and dim lighting. A trendy spot, perfect for impressing your date or co-​workers.

A classy little wine and lunch bar, great for stopping by during lunch hour or after work. A friend and I tried their pizzas the other day, and I was quite pleased. The pizzas are flat and crispy, layered with just enough toppings that it isn’t too much. I had the mushroom pizza, which was topped with plenty of thinly sliced mushrooms, basil and some kind of cheese, parmesan I think. Delicious — just on the verge of salty, but not too much that it would be.
Their lunch menu is a little small, but given that they’re new and also mainly a wine bar, this is understandable. They have a more extensive dinner menu, and their desserts don’t sound too bad either. I’m not a wine connoisseur, but I will say they have an impressive wine list.
My individual pizza came to about $ 15 incl. tip. Not somewhere to go if you’re looking for a quick and cheap lunch, but it’s good. We sat out on the front patio and basked in the sun over lunch. The patio is just large enough for four or five small tables, a couple of them with umbrellas.
As an aside, my friend and I watched as the waitress took off across the street at lightning speed to chase after a patron and give him his credit card after he left it behind. If that’s not great service, I don’t know what is!

Walking down 104 is always makes me feel good. I see a bunch of new places to check out and I’m just so excited to try them.
I finally took the plunge one lunch to try their lunch menu.
The interior is super swanky, super chic vibe but with the sun out, my friend and I couldn’t resist sitting on the patio to take in the nice weather. I was a little disappointed to discover that a lot trucks like to rip down this road which kind of took away the experience but I always enjoy patios nonetheless.
Although I didn’t try any of their wines, I still enjoyed the always default water. Their water had lemons in it which was a nice change.
I decided to try their sandwich: panino italiano. I don’t have a palette for Italian food but I’m working on it. I think this was my first experience eating authentic Italian meats so the taste was a little overwhelming. I came away feeling «this meat tastes game-​y».
To be honest, it was a struggle to get through the sandwich. Only until I got to the middle I tried to focus on mixing the flavors of the tomato-​y spread with the meat and cheese and the flavors mixed better.
Waitress was friendly and came by to check on us frequently.
My sandwich came with a very small salad with oil and balsalmic vinegar.
Sandwich came out to about $ 12.
I’d really love to come back and try their pasta but until I can figure out what I’m supposed to expect for Italian meats, I probably won’t order the sandwich again.