Jonathan Gold, the esteemed gourmand of the LA Weekly, has recently published his list of the top 20 Italian restaurants in the Los Angeles area. It is a list that I can’t really speak to the accuracy of, since I have only been to a less than a handful of the places mentioned: Angelini Osteria, Casa Bianca…that’s it. Not even Mozza yet! And to think I call this an LA food blog (well, half a food blog, anyway). How mortifying. It did make me a little sad, however, that he didn’t make space for the small osteria that I’ve been to half a dozen times, the place that for what it lacks in polish, size, and any semblance of a wine list makes up in idiosyncracy, oversized Sophia Loren posters, and the perfect northern Italian carbonara sauce. Namely, La Buca.

I suppose that La Buca can’t really hold much of a (Roman) candle to the high-octane Italian meccas that Gold waxes symphonic over: Valentino, La Terza, Vincenti, Drago. These are serious restaurants with serious goals, serious wine lists, and serious checks at the end of the evening that lead to serious discussions about fiscal responsibility, debt, and the necessity of eating Chex out of the box at Von’s at 2 in the morning while the stockers are refilling paper towels two aisles over.

La Buca and the new restaurant from the same owner, Briganti, are birds of a different feather. La Buca currently occupies a very small space on Melrose in the middle of Hollywood. (There is an expansion in the works that will probably take effect now any day, but as far as I know it’s still in its original space.) It features pastas and pizzas mostly in the $12-15 range, and entrees in the $16-25 range. The pizzas are very nice, but the keys here are the carbonara – made with egg yolks, not cream, in the northern style – and the gnocchi.

Gnocchi are something that I am particularly picky about, because one of the greatest meals of my life was a bowl of gnocchi I had fourteen years ago in a cramped trattoria in Lucca, made by a woman who was not unlike my own Sicilian great-grandmother, and I have spent the remaining years searching in vain for its equal. I’m certainly not saying that La Buca makes gnocchi as good as the ones I had in Lucca – but for less than $15, they are really quite good: pillowy, as you’ll often see gnocchi referred to, but still containing a richness that coats the mouth. That’s the real key to great gnocchi: richness without heaviness. Not unlike wine in that regard. How interesting. Anyway, La Buca does many things well, if on a modest scale, and if you live anywhere near Hollywood it’s well worth inquiring after one of their scant tables for the chance to be lectured on the true meaning of carbonara or the virtue of arugula pesto.

With a trail of happy evenings at La Buca behind us, and finding ourselves in Pasadena recently, we decided to give La Buca’s newly birthed sibling, Briganti, a spin. Briganti is on Mission Street in South Pasadena, only a few blocks away from the admirable wine shop, Mission Wines. The restaurant presents itself as a very different beast than La Buca; the dim lighting and rattling aluminum furniture are replaced with more traditional dining sights – lots of white, classy muted lighting, and space. Quite a bit of space. Well, at least you won’t get your arm bumped by your neighbor when reaching for the wine. That’s a plus. The menu carries some things over from La Buca, including some of the pizzas and the pasta choices, but no carbonara. Maybe the old lady who cooks most nights at La Buca is the only one with the correct carbonara technique? Who knows. There are a few more meat dishes on this menu, though.

We started off with an appetizer of burrata, oven-roasted tomatoes, and pesto. A dish that really is being served all over LA every second of every day, but there’s no denying that this version did it right: excellent pesto and great tomatoes. Good tomatoes are not normally something you would not see in February, but who am I to complain? They were sweet and had nice texture. For our second course, J had the risotto with mixed vegetables and sausage, while I had the pappardelle with a lamb ragu. I’ve got a bit of a weakness for the lamb ragu, so as soon as I had heard it pronounced as that days’s special, I turned to J and said, “It will be mine. Oh yes, it will be mine.” Even superseded the gnocchi. Both dishes were very well done, with La Buca’s trademark “hominess” in preparation and presentation. My ragu had chunks of carrot, celery, and other vegetable products that were bigger than the little globules of meat, but it tasted really good. J’s risotto was also nice.

We bought a half bottle of the 1997 Il Lastro Chianti Rufina at the restaurant, and it was a very nice wine – exquisitely perfumed with that sangiovese dust and berry mixture, with good structure on the palate. The acids I think were starting to fade from this one, but it certainly held up to the food. A good find.

The service was generally courteous, quick, and smart, although a lot of this might have had something to do with the fact that we were the only patrons inside for the first 3/4ths of our meal. Still, the friendliness of the waiters and busboys warrants mentioning.

All in all, Briganti was a good night out, and could definitely turn into one of our favorite places when we are both in the Pasadena way. Goldie, you can keep your Drago and your Ago and your Spago…well, maybe not that one. Give that one back. But for bang-for-your-buck Italian, it’s hard to do better than the one-two combo of Briganti and La Buca.