There are restaurants you go to for the food. And then there are restaurants you go to because they make you feel like yourself again.
Cesare Ristorante on West Third has always been the second kind. Chef Cesare Vietina and his wife Pamela have spent years quietly building something that doesn’t get talked about enough in this city — a genuinely warm Italian dining room where the staff actually knows your name, each dish is made with care, and nobody is performing hospitality. They just live it.
Now they have something to celebrate: a full liquor license.
For the regulars, this is the best news in a while. The crowd that has been coming in for years — the Cedars-Sinai doctors unwinding after long shifts, the neighbors who treat the dining room like an extension of their own living rooms — they’ve been asking. A glass of wine with dinner was always lovely. But now there’s a proper cocktail to go with it, and that changes the whole rhythm of an evening.
What’s also new is the energy after nine. Cesare’s has become a quiet word-of-mouth destination for a different kind of guest — the musicians, the writers, the painters, the people in this city who work until midnight and need somewhere to land that isn’t a bar but isn’t a restaurant either. It’s somewhere in between. A Negroni — and Cesare’s is worth ordering, given that he’s been making them since his days co-owning Capannina, the legendary club and restaurant in Forte dei Marmi, Italy, where the cocktail was practically a house drink — and a plate of something good. Something like the involtino di melanzane: eggplant rolled around ricotta, parmigiano, pine nuts and raisins, finished with tomato sauce, fresh mozzarella, basil and more parmigiano. It’s the kind of dish that sounds simple until it arrives and you understand exactly what it is. A corner booth and a conversation that goes longer than expected. The kind of night that refills you when you didn’t realize you were running low.
Los Angeles has no shortage of places to drink. But spots where the room itself has warmth built into the walls — where the owner actually comes to your table and means it — those are harder to find. West Third is one of those streets where you know things if you know where to look. Cesare Ristorante has been one of those things for a while. The full bar just makes it easier to stay.
If you haven’t been, go. If you have been, you already know. Either way, it’s worth telling someone about.
Cesare Ristorante is located on West Third Street in Los Angeles. Reservations recommended.
8636 W 3rd St, Los Angeles, CA 90048 (310) 273-3605
