Osteria Mozza Visited 2/13/2011 4.5 Forks

Osteria Mozza 6602 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90038

 This was my one "fancy" meal in LA and it was a fabulous choice by Vivi.  Apparently it took her 3 weeks to make a reservation and the only slot she could get was 9:30pm on a Sunday, so it had to be good right? Plus it's a Mario Batali backed restaurant so how could it not be great? Well, upon our first 10 minutes I almost had to deduct a few forks: they don't have cranberry juice (why?), forgot Erik's lime in his juice, ran out of polenta but didn't tell us until we tried to order it and didn't give us any butter or olive oil with our bread. But when the food came out, it totally redeemed all the silly initial mis-steps.


We started with the Ribollita ($12) which is basically minestrone soup but then soaked with bread and served in almost a cake-like formation.  It was like tasting solid soup but in a really good way.  It tasted exactly like a warm hearty minestrone soup without the liquid.  Amazing.  The restaurant is also famous for its mozzarella bar...how the world doesn't have more bars focused on mozzarella is beyond me.  We got the mozzarella with bacon ($15) and it was a bit salty but it's got very thick cuts of bacon on it, so salt is kind of unavoidable.  For our main meals, Erik got the lamp chop and Vivi got the butternut squash.  I got the squid ink pasta with Dungeness crab, sea urchin, and jalapeno ($19).  The waitress had warned me in advance that the pasta would be cold and was basically a fist full of pasta.  I was kind of hesitant to have a cold, seemingly small pasta dish but I couldn't pass up the opportunity to have crab, squid ink and sea urchin mixed into one dish.  When it came out, it did look a bit small but after having had the two other appetizers, I was a bit fuller than expected.  I had one bite of my pasta and I would have paid twice as much for it.  It was one of the best pasta dishes I've had in a while...if you read my review of the squid ink pasta at Mercat, you'll notice I loved that dish too, so apparently I am a huge squid ink pasta lover.  But this dish with the crab and sea urchin literally makes me want to call them up and pay them any amount of money to ship it over to NYC.  The jalapeno was very subtle but provided the right amount of heat.  Erik and Vivi both really liked their dish and we all agreed that it was a great pre-Valentine's Day meal for us.  We were so full by the end of meal, we actually had to pass on dessert (I know, it's sacrilege in a Italian restaurant).

The difference between eating in LA and NYC is that in NYC half your bill is dedicated to booze because you don't have to drive anywhere.  But in LA, you have to drive everywhere and also since Vivi and Erik have a baby, we weren't really in the mood to get hammered.  The total bill was $60 with tax and tip per person.  A great deal for wonderful, high quality food.