Osteria Mozza - Los Angeles

They were good enough to appear on the Michelin star map of 2009. Let's see if they still got it.

Amuse Bouche: creamy, memory foam pillows of smooth ricotta with a salty olive accent on a crisp niblet of toast. Yup, they still got it. They really still got it. I don't know what they were like in 2009, but I am already impressed. 

I regret ordering the Mozzarella Tasting to start. Not because it wasn't amazing, but because it WAS amazing. The domestic mozzarella is springy and milky-fresh. The domestic burrata is beautiful, filled with a cream of all things pure. The smoked mozzarella is the same perfect mozzarella with a layer of woodsy soot. These domestics are undeniably delicious, but I feel like I barely scratched the surface. Next time I'll order some of the more aged or more imported options as I feel their menu has more range than the tasting can show.

The Octopus comes on a fresh, seafoam bed of...celery. I hate celery. There is something about the taste, and I can't stand the flavor that permeates everything. But this isn't just celery. This isn't just the stuff your parents cut up and put peanut butter on for snacks. This celery smells like the evening dew, a just-pulled-out-of-the-sunkissed-field kind of flavor. Each crunchy bite is full of California sunshine and the fertile ground it lights. The octopus itself is something else. It's as melt-in-your-mouth soft as a campfire marshmallow, with almost-fragrant pearls of tastebud-clinging flesh.

The Ricotta & Egg Raviolo is a legend here, and it's no wonder. If you have the audacity to serve a single raviolo at this price, it better be the best raviolo I've ever had. 

It is remarkable. Unforgettable in a pond of browned butter goodness, housing an entire poached egg yolk inside that erupts into an amber lava erupt that oozes around the plate. It seeps into every pore of the sweet ricotta, a yellow cloak around an al dente delight.

The Tagliatelle is a far more "boring" pasta, if you consider flawless ribbon-pasta in a melt-in-your-mouth oxtail ragu to be boring. The shreds are soft without being overly fatty, a dense, rich beef interweaving through sharp tomato. 

I was nervous about the entree Trout. Fish is easy to ruin and hard to make memorable, but this is a trout with clout. Fatty, pink, and pretty, it comes apart with a mere flick of a fork. It's cooked like a medium-rare, a salmon steak, bright pink and a little raw in the middle. It's so east to dry out a thick cut like this, but this one has juice to spare, as the veins of fat melt into the meaty flakes of flesh.

We are too full for dessert, and I almost shed a tear for a meal well-done. I could just sit there and keep eating forever. Endless dishes, so many small plates; there is not a single thing on the menu that I don't want to try. Never change, Osteria Mozza. If Michelin ever comes back to LA, it will be because of you and Providence.