Old School Italian - Vito in Santa Monica

 Vito Ristorante rests nonchalantly on Ocean Park Blvd, just a few blocks from my new apartment. Opened in 1980 and maintained by 3 Neapolitan brothers Vito, Roberto and Giovanna Somma, Vito is classic old school Italian. Cozy tables and red leather booths bring patrons close together as the Italian waiters bustle around in bow ties and cravats. With accents so thick I couldn't discern "medium rare" from some intelligible Sicilian word, the servers definitely added to the Southern Italian mood.

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Kate Mantilini, Industry Staple

In the few short weeks I’ve been working the “biz”, my stepfather’s restaurant has popped up in conversation several times. The actors I work with often ask me about myself and my background. Inevitably we pass through my public school teacher mother, lawyer father, and reach the point where I admit, “Well, my stepfather’s a chef." "Where?"  "Kate Mantilini!”

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My Everest: Butternut Squash Lasagna

As I mentioned in my last post, I have been scouring Jonathan Gold's list of the 99 best restaurants in Los Angeles (2010). This led me to a transcendent culinary experience that I now talk incessantly about to anyone who will listen, along with a failed attempt at recreation: butternut squash lasagna. 

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