RESTAURANT REVIEW: Garduno’s Ristorante does pasta right

The lady who lived next door when I was very young was from Sicily, and her house was where I learned to love food. I’d stop in every afternoon for my after-school snack of crusty French bread dipped in Nonna’s simmering marinara sauce or ladled with canned Italian tomatoes and olive oil. My after-school activities were sorting bushels of artichokes at the long table in her garage, or picking ripe plums and apricots in her yard. When Nonna died a few years ago, hundreds of people who came to her funeral were treated to a recipe card that held Nonna’s Chicken Pastina.

Weaned at Nonna’s house, I grew up suspicious of other people’s pasta. I’ve never understood how such a perfectly simple thing can get so badly botched in the wrong hands, ending up a mushy mess at the end of my fork, after having been scalded for too long in boiling water, then drowned in sauce. Nonna knew: Cooking was about bringing out flavor, not murdering it.

Eventually I stopped ordering pasta in restaurants altogether. Then, like everyone else, I became carb-phobic, and virtually stopped preparing it at home. But good pasta to me is still the ultimate treat, and fortunately today I live down the road, if not next door to, another authentic Italian kitchen.

Stepping in to Garduno’s at the corner of Santa Ana and 17th Street reminds me of popping in to Nonna’s kitchen, if not just for the smells, then for the sounds of cooking activity and the friendly chat between owners Mark and Julia Garduno and their loyal clientele of nearly 20 years. Mark, of Italian and French descent, is usually in the kitchen and Julia, along with a small wait staff, takes care of customers who crowd the restaurant’s two cozy and comfortable rooms.

Come with expectations, because if you don’t see it on the menu, Mark can probably make it for you. Or choose from daily pesce and pasta specials, or the mostly southern Italian menu items, from antipasto to dolce.

On my last visit, I did all of the above, starting with a simple, fragrant bruschetta with fresh mozzarella to add girth (I was starving). Everything at Garduno’s is fragrant, thanks to an abundance of herbs and a chef who knows how to use them. A simple house salad of greens reminded me I was merely at the beginning of my meal; there was so much more to come.

Julia then brought out salmon poached in a creamy mustard/dill and artichoke sauce, one of the day’s specials. If there’s anything else I rarely order for fear of disappointment, it’s salmon, but this was delicate, pink and plump as it should be. Better still, the light dill sauce was delicious enough to want to drag your fingers through if you’ve run out of bread, which I had. But I resisted.

Instead I moved on to another of the day’s specials: an artichoke ravioli with chicken breast, mushrooms and sun-dried tomatoes. This was the dish that moved me. The deep-green ravioli were rich pillows of cheese under a light blanket of blush sauce. But don’t look for blush sauce on the menu; it’s one of those items Mark mixes at will — creamy tomato with a little Marsala wine and Parmesan cheese. Try it on the fried mozzarella, but do so in moderation so you can keep eating.

I still haven’t told you how that pasta was because I am still trying to come up with the words. Ambrosial. Succulent. Toothsome. The handmade ravioli at Garduno’s is all of these.

Like I said, pasta is a treat, and if it’s made on the premises and cooked al dente, it can right almost any wrong. I walked in to the restaurant tired and cranky after a tough day, and by the time I’d settled on which dessert to take home, my day seemed almost tranquil.

There’s one thing better than perfect pasta, and that’s perfect pasta that precedes perfect cannoli. Garduno’s little pastry tubes are one of the only items not made on the premises. They are filled with chocolate chip-spiked ricotta and graced with cinnamon oil that lends a spiciness I hadn’t expected. My appetite finally returned sometime past midnight, and still the cannoli shell was crisp, though it had been in my fridge for hours.

Garduno’s has a selection of Italian and domestic wines, and also shares a parking lot with Winestyles, where many patrons first stop to choose something to drink with their dinner for a $12 corkage fee.

My dining companion and I chose instead to drink in the opera music playing in the background. Having returned from an Italian vacation just two days ago, she said it was like she never left. I’ve never been to Italy, but I’ve been to Nonna’s kitchen, and I go back again each time I visit Garduno’s.

ELIZABETH GLAZNER is the features editor. She can be reached at (714) 966-4624 or [email protected].