Family Heirloom: Gaetano’s in Torrance celebrate generations of restaurateurs

Vince Giuliano, Angie Masincup (Manager), Efrain Regino (Kitchen Manager) Ken Okamoto (Manager). photos by Tony LaBruno

by Richard Foss

          In Los Angeles, something a century old is, well, old. The South Bay was mainly agricultural or chapparal in 1924, and as little as fifty years ago there were still open fields where office buildings and tract homes now stand. Compare that with European or Asian countries where there are many businesses that were under the same family ownership for multiple generations, and you will get a sense of why travelers sometimes find our historic landmarks quaint.

         It’s a bit odd that a local restaurant that celebrates a family legacy is in a modern and anonymous building in a sprawling shopping center. Gaetano’s is named after Gaetano Giulianio, who came from a family of grocers and opened a deli in Gardena in 1952. Two of Gaetano’s grandchildren opened a deli in Torrance in 1993, and after the great-grandchildren took over the business, it became the more upscale restaurant that it is now. That restaurant is a typical modern mall spot, but the walls are decorated with black and white images of family members in kitchens, restaurants, and at family tables.

 

Spaghetti with Grandma’s Dot’s meatballs.

         The mix of modern and traditional extends to the menu, which includes Italian-American classics and some modern items like an asparagus and avocado salad. Still, the attitude here is traditional. They boast that most pastas and all dressings are made in house, which is as it should be. Classic Italian cooking is simple, and in simple dishes you taste the freshness of every ingredient.  

         Our trio of diners started a meal with an appetizer of stuffed artichoke hearts and a pear and gorgonzola salad. We almost didn’t order the artichokes because we weren’t sure what they were. There are two very different things called stuffed artichokes, one where cheese, herbs, and butter are stuffed between the leaves of an artichoke that is then baked, and another that involves taking the hearts that have been completely cleaned, halving them, and filing them before baking. The former version can be tasty but is generally a greasy mess to eat, so I rarely order it. Gaetano’s serves the type that can be eaten decorously with a fork, and it has a pretty presentation too, a circle of halved artichoke hearts stuffed with parmesan, herbs, and breadcrumbs neatly arranged around some colorful salad greens. The flavor was very delicate, and I wished for a bit more garlic and pepper to make it zippier, but it was good as it was.

         The pear and gorgonzola salad had a more interesting flavor balance and was different from most because it was topped with slices of avocado. I don’t remember seeing avocado paired with pears before, but it works. The chef had found the right gorgonzola for the job – this cheese can range anywhere from mild to sharply pungent, and the medium version HERE had just enough bite to match the sweet fruit and dried cranberries. The salad was good with the pear vinaigrette that is usually served with it, but I found it to be even better with the house-made green goddess dressing that is usually served with the asparagus salad. It’s rare to find green goddess, a culinary relic of the 1920’s, in local eateries, but it goes remarkably well with many salad combinations. Ask for both dressings when you order, and you may be surprised.

It’s worth noting that our server Harmony accommodated our request for the dressing and answered questions with graceful courtesy, and that the staff here works very well together. They were all unobtrusive, but empty plates disappeared, and waters were refilled with quiet efficiency.  

         For our main dishes we had a vegetarian pizza, the herb crusted halibut with pesto sauce, and cavatappi alla panna, corkscrew pasta with shrimp, peas, and herbs in a parmesan cream sauce. I had to order the cavatappi because it’s rare to find this pasta in small restaurants – it’s time consuming and fiddly to get the shape perfect. Sure enough, the shapes were not the perfect spirals that you get from industrially made pasta, but the kind of squiggles an Italian cook might make at home. What matters is that they had the right texture of fresh pasta, and that the parmesan cream sauce had the right flavor to meld the other ingredients. The bowl of pasta was topped with a sprig of fresh basil leaves, and those these may have been intended to be decorative, I tore mine up and ate them with the rest. It was a simple dish with five ingredients, and it fit the Italian aesthetic.

 

Herb crusted halibut with pesto.

         The pizza was very good, a thin crust that had enough crispness and integrity to support the cheese and toppings when you picked it up, with a nicely risen crust that had some sourdough flavor. The star of the meal, though, was the halibut, which had been coated with herbed breadcrumbs and broiled to perfect doneness, topped with a tangy pesto, and put atop linguine in a simple pol and garlic sauce. This comes with the vegetable of the day, which was green beans when we were there, and it was a generously portioned meal that was also a beautiful plate of food.

         With our appetizers we tried their house cocktails, a honey-bourbon old fashioned, blood orange mojito, and gin & ginger limoncello. The limoncello was a novel idea well executed, and all three had a fine flavor balance. We accompanied our meal with wines by the glass from their short list, which favors new world makers over Italians. They are stronger on reds than whites, and it would be good to see some more Italian wines on their list, but you will probably LIKELY find something to like here.

         We tried two desserts, the tiramisu and a flourless chocolate cake. The tiramisu was not to my taste, as it was very sweet and creamy and needed a bit more chocolate and coffee for balance, but the cake was first rate. It’s served over crème anglaise, and they’ll put that on the side if you prefer ASK.

         Gaetano’s is not wildly ambitious, and that’s just fine. While there are a few things that might have been alien to the owners’ great-grandfather, who probably never imagined that avocado would be part of an Italian dish, you have to imagine that if he had tried it, he would have approved. The details are different, but the balance of flavors might be from a village in Romagna, and that’s what matters.

Gaetano’s is at 2731 PCH in Torrance, near the northwest corner with Crenshaw. Open daily 11 a.m., close 9 p.m. Su-Thu, 10 p.m. Fr-Sa, parking lot, wheelchair access good. Some vegetarian items, full bar, corkage $20. Phone (310) 326-3354, website at gaetanosonline.com

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