Photography by Peden + Munk for Angeleno

Everyone’s talking about the spaghetti—which seems like a strange dish to obsess about. Obviously, this isn’t your typical bowl of pasta. It’s magical spaghetti. OK, well, no, not exactly. So how do I explain why it’s causing such a stir? First, it’s beautiful—a vertical swirl of noodles, a towering beehive of carbs whose every strand is slobbered with a thin sheen of bright red, almost orange tomato sauce (the only red-sauce item on the menu) whose tomatoes taste like they might have been grown at Chino Farms (in the VIP section), or maybe in the backyard of someone’s grandma in Puglia, picked just a few hours ago, still warm and bursting with sunshine. The pasta is perfectly cooked, the very definition of “al dente.” Every bite suggests a mouthful of basil, even though it contains only a fleck. And then there’s the idea of eating the perfect spaghetti not in a dumpy trattoria with checkered tablecloths but in one of the city’s most elegant, grown-up dining rooms. Continue reading →