RESTAURANT REVIEW : Yet Another Reason to Go to Old Town

Does the Southland need yet another small, mid-priced Italian restaurant? In Pasadena’s Old Town, at least, the saturation point clearly hasn’t been reached. Lines are already forming at the airy new La Risata in the old Cafe 60 North space.

The owner, Varo Angeletti, opened the hugely popular Il Sorriso more than a year ago right around the corner on Colorado Boulevard. Il Sorriso means “the smile” in Italian. Angeletti’s second restaurant, La Risata, translates as “the laugh.” One can’t help but speculate what his next place will be called--Il Parossismo, “the paroxysm,” perhaps, or Il Singhizzo, “the sob”?

It seems fated that Angeletti will keep escalating the humor and opening these modest and modestly priced Italian restaurants. For the money, they’re among the best Pasadena has to offer.

The patio of Cafe 60 North has been enclosed in Angeletti’s renovations, yet, oddly, La Risata seems brighter and fresher than the former lunch spot. The walls are brick, the ceiling gloriously high. In the afternoons, open windows admit a lively breeze. Sage-green cafe chairs feel light and a bit flimsy, but once we’re in place, who notices?

Meals unfold pleasantly here without many glitches, although the kitchen tends to send out entrees before we are finished with our starters, and sometimes what’s on our plate is not exactly what we ordered. The staff is competent and friendly--very friendly: One waitress compliments me on my jewelry, a friend on her hair color and my friend’s husband on his hat.

The dinner menu is large and varied; starred items are those available at lunch. The food is straightforward, direct, not particularly subtle, but definitely competent and flavorful. Bread arrives with a warm, pea-studded marinara for dipping.

The vegetable antipasti --marinated mixed vegetables, grilled artichokes and sauteed radicchio with smoked mozzarella cheese--are all unusual and delicious. The grilled artichokes are actually artichoke hearts with only a fringe of delicate inner leaves, as crispy and fun as potato chips. The thin strips of smoky, marinated eggplant alone are worth the whole price of the mixed vegetable platter.

Swordfish carpaccio draped over juicy cantaloupe is luscious. Caprese salad, fortified with anchovies, will be better when tomatoes improve later this spring. A generous portion of New Zealand mussels and clams come with toast, in approximately the same sauce in which we’ve already been dunking our bread (minus the peas).

A delicious country soup with zucchini, tomatoes and the short macaroni called ditalini has a full-bodied broth thickened with potatoes. A special asparagus soup surprises us with its strongly tomato base and large percentage of macaroni--it’s almost a pasta.

Risotto is done well here: not too rich, and stirred to the precise point of pleasurable graininess. An herbed risotto comes topped with six perfectly grilled sea scallops, so thick they look like tree trunks. A risotto with baby artichokes is also pretty good, but contains funny little globs of melted cheese and no hint of the green peppercorns promised on the menu.

I order trenette , a long, thin pasta, but get a bowl of bows-- farfalle , or bow-tie pasta--with pesto and potatoes. While I appreciate the wordplay, I’d not only been looking forward to trenette , but am disappointed to find the pesto thinned with cream, which considerably dulls the flavor.

The entrees tend to be big, generous plates of food. I especially enjoy the grilled salmon with fennel and a skinless chicken breast in a nice, light sauce spiked with balsamic vinegar. Special lamb chops served with a porcini mushroom sauce are tasty but overcooked, barely pink.

The staff seems to push the house-made cheesecakes, with crusts that taste not unpleasantly like burnt cookies. But the banana cream pie, cold and fresh with a great flaky crust, is much better.

* La Risata, 60 N . Raymond Ave., Pasadena, (818) 793-9000. Lunch Monday through Saturday, dinner seven nights. Beer and wine. All major credit cards accepted. Dinner for two, food only, $25-$52.