February 8, 2015: Alimento

Alimento opened about 8 months ago to much anticipation and has been written about quite extensively. The chef/owner, Zach Pollack, has garnered positive attention at all the restaurants he has worked at before this and Alimento has been on my short list of L.A. restaurants to try since it opened.

We arrived a little bit late and were seated promptly by the host. Luckily our reservation was early in the evening because as the night wore on and the restaurant became filled to capacity the noise level ramped up considerably to where it was difficult for me to hear Christal at times. For some reason it seemed like our table was in between the two waiters’ territories because the waiter that introduced himself at the beginning of the meal ended up checking on us one other time, and that was at the end when he asked us if he wanted to order any dessert after we had finished our dessert. The other waiter seemed to have arrived a little late and checked on us once to see if we wanted dessert after we finished our main courses. The host ended up waiting on us more than the actual waiters and the busboy and runner worked like stealth ninjas. When I was writing the tip on the check I felt bad because I didn’t feel like the waiters deserved any of it and that it should all have gone to the host, runner and busboy, but alas, the world isn’t fair. Anyway, now we’ll get on to the real star, the food.

Christal started her meal with the white bean and emmer zuppa with Fresno chilies and bread. Emmer is basically another name for faro. The soup was much better than it looked. It was extremely flavorful and hearty and the chilies gave it a nice kick. The emmer gave the soup a nice chewy meatiness to contrast with the soft tenderness of the white beans. The bread was grilled to perfection and had a glutinous chewiness enveloped in a crunchy envelope. My only wish was that there was about three more pieces of bread. 

White Bean & Emmer Zuppa w Fresno Chilies & Bread

I ordered the veal tongue tonnato with radishes, pickles and celery. This dish was the chef’s take on the classic Italian dish, vitello tonnato, which I have not had before. The tonnato sauce is like a thin mayonnaise-like sauce flavored with tuna and it was a salty rich revelation. The veal tongue was sliced deli-thin and when paired with the tonnato it seemed like the sauce overpowered it. The pickles provided the needed acidity to cut through the richness of the tonnato sauce. After a couple of bites I finally wised up and started using less of the tonnato sauce with each bite and the dish became infinitely better. Of course after all the veal tongue and garnishes were finished I couldn’t just waste the tonnato sauce. Unfortunately there was no bread so I just spooned it up and ate it like the white bean and emmer soup.

Veal Tongue Tonnato w Radishes, Pickles & Celery 

For her entrée Christal ordered the whole wheat bigoli with tomato, pinenuts and fiore sardo. Bigoli is basically a thicker spaghetti and it has a really good chewy texture. Fiore sardo is a firm Sardinian sheep’s milk cheese that provided the dish with the salty richness to balance the sweet acidity of the tomato. The pinenuts gave the dish a nuttiness that helped to round it out. The whole dish was composed perfectly.

Whole Wheat Bigoli w Tomato, Pinenuts & Fiore Sardo 

My main course was the radiatori with braised pork sugo, kale and fennel pollen. The radiatori pasta was cooked to a perfect al dente and had a great toothsome bite to it. The pork sugo was filled with chunks of tender meaty pork that was slow cooked to perfection. Unfortunately, I had a hard time detecting the fennel pollen in the dish because the sugo was really rich and tomatoey. Aside from the lack of fennel pollen flavor the dish was a really satisfying plate of pasta.

Radiatori w Braised Pork Sugo, Kale & Fennel Pollen

For dessert Christal and I decided to share the polenta almond cake with blueberries and mascarpone cheese. To me this was the most surprising dish of the night. The cake was really moist and appropriately dense with a ton of lemon zest in it that totally surprised me. The blueberry compote gave it extra sweetness and paired with the lemon zest in the cake perfectly. The mascarpone added richness to the dessert that made it seem more like a dessert than a sinful brunch item you might have on Sunday.  It provided a fitting end to the meal and I would have to say that Alimento’s food met my expectations, even if the service didn’t.

Polenta Almond Cake w Blueberries & Mascarpone 

Food 4/5
Service 1.5/5 for the waiters & 4/5 for the host, busboy and runner
Christal's Rating 2/5 (-1 cause of service)
http://www.alimentola.com/