LAFW Day One: Giada's Festa Italiana Kicks Things Off

Gino Angelini and the famous lasagna

By Lesley Balla

The organizers of the Los Angeles Food & Wine know a few things about throwing a party and picking the perfect host. At last night's kick-off event, the Festa Italiana held at Nokia Plaza at L.A. Live, people waited endlessly to say hello to hostess Giada De Laurentiis. Her chef helpers served a nice cous cous salad and penne pasta, classic Food Network Giada dishes, but she was kept busy shaking hands and taking photos. It's as if she was the only chef there, which of course wasn't true.
While she and Michael Chiarello pulled in a lot of people to their tables, we made sure to make our way around to the other 40 or so restaurants, nibbled on some fantastic dishes from local and visiting chefs and sipped lots of wine. Vic Casanova (Gusto) brought braciole, Terroni rolled pasta on the spot, Antonia Lafaso (Black Market) and Danny Elmaleh (Mercato di Vetro, Cleo) fried squash blossoms, and 800 Degrees kept pies coming from a big red mobile pizza oven. There was a lot of pork, but a surprisingly low amount of bacon (have we finally moved beyond bacon?). The best, maybe the only, way to end a hot night on the red carpet was with a tequila-spiked watermelon push-up pop from the Cosmopolitan Las Vegas. Thank goodness for those pops.

Check out our slideshow of opening night, and look for more updates from the splashy weekend soon.