Tradition has never restrained Los Angeles creatively. That's true whether we're discussing movies and TV, music, or food. Some chefs who have made major impacts on the city's Italian food scene don’t necessarily have Italian roots, including Nancy Silverton (Mozza and Pizzette), Ori Menashe (Bestia), and Matt Molina (Hippo and Triple Beam Pizza). These talented chefs and their partners have still created unique Italian restaurants and dishes informed by personal visions. They often defy traditional expectations for Italian food, and their choice of cuisine raises questions about who gets to cook food unconnected to heritage, a recurring theme in today’s culinary landscape that doesn’t just apply to Italy.
L.A. native Mindy Oh is executive chef at Mora Italiano in Encino and a sister restaurant by the same name on a Mid-City rooftop. She displays a particular flair with pasta on her seasonal menu. According to Oh’s bio, “She stays true to Italian tradition, while incorporating her own modern touch.”
Mindy Oh from Mora. Credit: Jim Sullivan
Oh sees parallels between California cuisine and Italian cooking. “There are Italian aspects to my food, but sometimes my dishes may come across as more Californian than Italian,” she says. “They both focus on utilizing super fresh ingredients, highlighting what is in season while working the ingredients as little as possible.”
“I don't feel that non-Italian chefs are misappropriating Italian culture by cooking the cuisine,” Oh says. “On the contrary, we are paying respect.”
Oh feels it’s essential to put in the work and perform proper research to understand the basics before riffing on dishes. “As long as the cook pays their due diligence to Italian cooking and culture, I think that's all that is needed in order to approach Italian food respectfully,” she says.
Oh credits Angelenos with keeping open minds and staying “more accepting of non-traditional food, whether it be Italian or non-Italian food. A lot of people from L.A. are immigrants that are putting together things that we came up with based on what we grew up with, and blending it with what our parents grew up with.”
English pea toast from Mora. Credit: Mora Italiano
L.A. also isn’t beholden to European dining standards that often steer conversations back East. “Food hasn't been held to the same standards as the New York dining scene where you have to play by a Michelin guidebook,” she says. “A lot of L.A. chefs have decided to cook more for themselves rather than adhering to certain expectations. Because we are cooking something that we would enjoy ourselves, we make food that others would enjoy as well, whether or not that is traditional.”
Zach Pollack is another L.A. chef who breaks the rules in creative ways. He runs Alimento near Silver Lake Reservoir, which “draws inspiration from Italy's regional traditions while not adhering too strictly to them.” He also operates the Italian-American pizzeria Cosa Buona in Echo Park. Pollack previously cooked with chef Steve Samson at Pizzeria Ortica at Costa Mesa’s South Coast Plaza before they partnered on Sotto in Beverlywood. A “random twist of fate” during his Brown University days led to a semester abroad in Florence and resulted in his Italian focus.
Zach Pollack. Credit: Dylan + Jeni
“Those few months in Florence totally changed my trajectory,” Pollack says. “I became consumed by Italian cooking and the entire Italian ethos around food and wine in general. I didn’t hone a love for cooking down to a love for Italian cooking. Quite the opposite: I found a love for cooking through my love of Italy.”
He’s accomplished great success with Italian cooking and challenges whether being Italian is important when cooking Italian food. “Being Italian has nothing to do with it,” Pollack says. “Some of the finest and, indeed, most traditional Italian food is made by Japanese chefs in Tokyo. Why? Because their experience was mined at the source. Thousands of aspiring Japanese chefs work for months or years in Italy before returning home to open their own places.”
“There is something to be said for proximity to the source,” Pollack says. “The greater the degrees of separation from the traditions in question, the more opportunity for non-Italian subjectivities to get in the way. That doesn’t mean the chef who learns this way will put out inferior food. It may be extraordinary. It just means that their food is probably not altogether very Italian.”
Cosa Buona's Meatlovers pizza. Credit: Dylan + Jeni
Pollack straddles the line between Italian culinary tradition and innovation. “There are two main groups of experience I draw on: growing up and living in L.A., and spending a good chunk of my early 20s living in Italy,” he says. “I’m constantly invoking Italian traditions when I think about a new dish, but I almost always inflect them with something personal. The inflection might be an ingredient or a technique; it might come from my Ashkenazi heritage, or it might come from a meal at a taco truck or a sushi bar.”
Pollack doesn’t see atypical cooking or cooks as uniquely L.A. traits. “The restaurant boom of the past 10 or so years has produced a lot of great chefs cooking food not associated with their birthplace or upbringing, and I don’t think it’s limited to Italian food or L.A.,” he says.
Maureen Vincenti has been a vital part of L.A.’s Italian food scene since late husband Mauro ran pioneering Rex il Ristorante downtown. In 1997, she opened Vincenti Ristorante in Brentwood with Rex alums Nicola Mastronardi and Gino Angelini, who later opened Angelini Osteria. Vincenti has more than enough Italian food experience to have clear perspective.
“25 to 30 years ago I would have said that it was absolutely important that the chef for an Italian restaurant be an actual Italian who trained in Italy, going through the various ‘stages’ one did then,” Vincenti says. “In today's world, any person who would like to be a chef is able to travel to Italy and learn under great Italian chefs, and if this person has ‘talent,’ they can cook food with great and genuine results.” Talent and passion are also prerequisites.
“Accessibility to great Italian product is still of utmost importance, however, for any chef, Italian or not,” Vincenti says. Of course customers unfamiliar with true Italian food may not get the references or value traditional ingredients. “Many people who dine out these days in Los Angeles, do not actually know what the real flavors/products of true Italian cuisine are,” she says. “The earth, water, grains, fruits and vegetables, fish, meat, etc... which are part of Italian cuisine cannot be replicated here.”
L.A. has deep cultural roots, but certain traditions don’t run quite so deep. Italian food is still a relatively recent phenomenon here. Perception of Italian and other cuisines has also become blurry. “How one achieves success in Los Angeles as a chef is very distorted these days,” Vincenti says. “No longer is tradition in cooking a requisite for success… With the development of the internet, the world and how we learn things has changed the way we eat and what we think is good food.”
Piero Selvaggio has seen it all since opening Valentino in Santa Monica in 1972 and running the restaurant until 2018. He helped launch Louie’s by the Bay in Newport Beach before recently returning to L.A. to join longtime friend (and fellow Sicilian) Celestino Drago as Drago Centro’s managing partner. He helped introduce many Italian ingredients that American diners now take for granted, including mozzarella, prosciutto, burrata, and balsamic vinegar.
Selvaggio bemoans the lack of Italian culinary talent choosing to come to the U.S., a contributing factor in why so many other people play key roles in Italian kitchens. “There aren't that many talents in Italy that are willing to come for the money or the experience, and prefer other countries where they pay well like China, Japan, and lately, the many oil-rich Arab countries,” he says. “Things have dramatically changed since over 30 years ago, when I used to bring young talents by the bunches…Today, in turn, people have American or non-American chefs in their restaurants. Can these people cook Italian? Absolutely.”
Selvaggio points to chefs who learned at the source and have been celebrated in L.A., including Mozza chef Nancy Silverton, who runs “a respected Italian emporio,” and Felix chef Evan Funke, who “claims to make the best pasta in town.” Selvaggio says, “Maybe he does (I don't know), but here is the perfect example that as an American, feels to cook as well as the Italians of the Peninsula and enjoy success.”
In many cases, succeeding in Italian kitchens (or other types of restaurants) simply comes down to ambition. “Heritage is not important, since it is up to the individual to decide how high they want to go,” Selvaggio says.
“I tend to think that if someone approaches learning another culture’s cuisine with deference and dedication, then nothing should be off the table,” Pollack says. “On the other hand, given that many of the resources necessary to succeed as a chef disproportionately favor white folks, I have trouble rationalizing or embracing certain situations.”
In the modern restaurant world where diners and journalists debate which chefs and restaurateurs deserve to benefit from particular culinary traditions, lines again get blurry, and Italy is just part of the conversation.
Main image of Chicken Liver Crostone from Alimento. Credit: Dylan + Jeni