Date Night :: All Things Andy Gavin

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Quick Eats – Colapasta

Oct31

Location: 1241 5th St, Santa Monica, CA 90401. (310) 310-8336

Date: September 18, 2019

Cuisine: Italian / Just pasta

Rating: Simple menu, but good pasta, very casual

There seems to be a bit of a trend to opening pasta restaurants in Santa Monica.

Colapasta is a super casual small menu artisanal pasta place by Stefano De Lorenzo the main chef from La Botte years ago. The place is brand new and the concept is very similar to Uovo on the other side of the Promenade. They both have very short lists of classic pasta and little else on the menu.

The decor is simple and the space is modest — not too unlike Ramen Roll. haha.

The menu. You can basically see that it’s mostly pasta. A salad or two as well. No liquor license yet but they have applied for a 41 (beer and wine).

Zuppa di Granoturco. Sweet Summer Corn Soup.

Bresola Arugula e Burrata. Sliced paper-thin Aged Beef, arugula, Burrata. This is pretty much a perfect “salad” for me as I love Burrata (and this is a good one, either from Italy or more likely from Stefano locally, but in the Italian style and very good). The burrata and cured meat combo is one of my favorites. Arugula helps push it down.

Bigoli Aglio Olio e Acciughe (Campania). Bigoli Pasta with Garlic, Oil, Anchoives. This is a simple pasta, but with that anchovy pasta it has a delightful garlicky umami.

Casunziei (Dolomiti). Half Moon shaped Red Beet Ravioli, Brown Butter, Poppy Seeds. This is one of the chef’s signatures. It’s very Po River Valley (Mantua, Verona etc). Sweet and rich, quite delicious.

Lasagna Classica al Ragu (Emilia). Classic Beef Ragu Lasagna. The basta was delicate and the ragu had great flavor. It just needed a Béchamel sauce to be perfect.

Pasta lurks in the fridge.

Overall, this was a pleasant and VERY quick little meal. The pasta is good. It’s not radical or terribly LA in style like Felix or anything — it’s very homestyle (Italy) Italian. Very simple. They are, however, inexpensive, and well executed. So if you have a need for a noodle fix and don’t want to break the bank, you could do well here. Probably slightly more my taste than Uovo. Not nearly as good or as much variety as Heroic Wine Bar down the street.

For more LA dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Colapasta, Date Night, pasta, Santa Monica

Date Night at Madeo

Mar27

Restaurant: Madeo

Location: 362 N Camden Dr, Beverly Hills, CA 90210. (310) 859-4903

Date: March 1, 2019

Cuisine: Italian

Rating: Good, and a scene, but pricey

My wife and I are always casting out for the intersection of our tastes on our date nights and it had been forever (at least a decade, probably more) since I was at:

Madeo — which has (I think temporarily) moved to Camden from their longstanding location. This is an LA mainstay medium old school Italian. The menu is fairly 80-90s high end Italian like Toscana.

The scene was off the hook. Very crowded with lots of “celebrity types” (looked like menu music industry people). There were also A LOT of heavy age gap couples — like the dark haired heavy dude in the far left (looked like 50s) and his early 20s date. They were making out in case one wondered if it was a different relationship.

From my cellar: NV Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin Champagne Extra Brut Extra Old. 90 points. Bone white! Tiny consistent bubbles.
Crushed bone, slate, minerals, oyster shell. Bone dry, medium finish, super high minerality. Bracing. An excellent value bubble. Better than the regular.

Pizza bread just like at Toscana.

Salmone Fresco Alle Erbe. Fresh salmon carpaccio with fresh herbs.

Carpaccio. Filet mignon, carpaccio, served with artichokes, parmigiano cheese and rucola. Very solid traditional carpaccio.

Rigatoni Mozzarella E Pomodoro. Diced eggplant and fresh mozzarella in a tomato sauce. My wife liked it, which is what matters.

Cacciucco. Fresh seafood soup in tomato sauce. Broth was good, if slightly salty and not a huge amount of it. Lots of good seafood, although it did have a pretty briny “seafood” smell. Really a mussels smell. I’ve had better, but this was a very respectable version of this dish.

Overall, service was very good at Madeo, and it’s quite a scene. Food was good, but for the price, not as good as I thought it should have been. I like Toscana’s food better and they are very similar style (if a tiny bit less of a scene).

For more LA dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Champagne, Date Night, Italian Cusine, Madeo, scene

Piedmont at Maude

Dec05

Restaurant: Maude [1, 2, 3]

Location: 212 South Beverly Drive. Beverly Hills, CA. (310) 859-3418

Date: October 10, 2018

Cuisine: French Californian

Rating: Great Theme

When it opened several years ago, Maude was a big deal on the LA restaurant scene. For quite some time they had a unique “one ingredient, one month” theme. I had gone 4 years ago in late 2014. But that was back several chefs ago, and now-a-days they have a “season” (of 3 months I think) with a wine theme and food to match. Reversing their early hesitation about corkage, if you bring on theme — you now get free corkage. yay! I went earlier this year for Burgundy and now I’m back with my wife on “date night” for Piedmont.

It’s still located on Beverly in Beverly Hills.

It’s still cute inside.

Quite small with an open kitchen.

Elegant table settings.

Tonight’s menu.

From my cellar: 1999 Paitin di Pasquero-Elia Barbaresco Vecchie Vigne Sorì Paitin. VM 92. The 1999 Barbaresco Sorì Paitin Vecchie Vigne is dark, powerful and opulent, with more than enough stuffing to age well for the better part of the next decade. Smoke, menthol, tar, black fruit and French oak blossom in the glass as this resonant, exuberant Barbaresco show off its unique, totally compelling personality. The French oak is present, but well balanced at the same time.

Bagna Cauda. Fresh farmer’s market vegetables.

And dip.

Bacalao. Parsley, garlic. Cod — with butter!

Agnolotti. Rocchetta Cheese. Could have eaten about 100 more of these.

Vitello Tonnato. Raw tuna on cheese with capers and EVOO.

Tajarin. Bresola, sage. Fetticini-like pasta with like bits of cured beef.

Ravioli. Braised veal and truffles! Awesome.

Vegetarian version without the veal.

Stick a knife in it.

Finanziera. Young beef, foie gras, sweetbread. Good stuff. Rich on rich.

A vegetarian alternative. Looks pretty meaty too.

Occelli al Barolo. Cheese soaked in barolo!

Bread.

In Maude 2.0 you go upstairs for dessert, which I really like. Last time, they had this incredible cheese and dessert buffet. They said that almost killed the pastry chef and now it’s been simplified. Too bad!

Sharon takes it in. Still there was a lot of good stuff up here.

Panna Cotta. Orange, persimmon, honeycomb. Delicious!

“Hot chocolate” with marshmallow and other goodness.

Petit fours.

Some kind of tea. May have been mint tea.

Oh, and they have little “presents” for the morning.

I found this new format for Maude much more pleasant. The food was good. Some dishes were excellent, really good, and some just solid. The service was fabulous. They were trying to go Italian with some success but it still felt a bit French — although certainly very good. The whole no corkage thing is a welcome relief. I loved the 2 locations thing and the loungey location upstairs. All in all a super fun evening!

For more LA dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Date Night, Italian wine, Maude, Piedmont

Going Native

Sep08

Restaurant: Native

Location: 620 Santa Monica Blvd Suite A, Santa Monica, CA 90401. (310) 458-4427

Date: July 7, 2018

Cuisine: California Small Plates

Rating: Have to try more

When we last checked in with Nyesha Arrington, she was helming Leona. Now that’s closed and she’s opened a new place in the Santa Monica Yacht Club space. I never even made it to SMYC, always meant to, as friends were owners. Although I have mixed feelings about Tar & Roses (their other place).

Anyway, I mostly remember Native’s space as La Botte, Antonio Mure’s Italian some years ago.

The surface details are a bit different, and I don’t remember the bar before, but the bones are basically the same.

The brunch and dinner menus.

We sat at the bar for a quick meal and the bartender was very nice — and talented with the cubes.

Heirloom tomato peach salad. basil, banyuls vinaigrette. There was burrata too, even though the menu doesn’t mention it. Every place has one of these salads these days.

Yagyu beef tartare. Maui onion, aisoon sauce, korean mustard. This was a nice beef tartar, to a large extent because of the insanely mustardy mustard — loved it.

Special. Pan fried tandoori seasoned chicken with mini-naan. The naan was weird and soggy, but the chicken was solid and tasty.

We just stopped in for a quick bite, so this isn’t a fair test of the kitchen (not that the menu is that big). I’ll have to come back with a bigger group, and wine. We could order pretty much everything with 6-8 (of my) people.

For more LA dining reviews click here.