THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED Calitalia Restaurant & Lounge

THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED Calitalia Restaurant & Lounge Restaurant Review:

This comfortable café in Old Town Calabasas opened as Native Café but is now called Calitalia. Owner Renee Lebow, of Native American descent, believes in using only natural ingredients with an emphasis on healthful dishes. She also likes to buy produce grown locally. Chef Joel Jiminez worked in this same spot as when it was Gaetano’s Italian restaurant. Together the two have created a menu that features some notable classic Italian dishes, like osso buco with saffron risotto and chicken Parmesan alongside heart-healthy entrées like Chilean sea bass in a caper sauce and maple-glazed wild salmon. The eggplant slices stuffed with angel hair pasta are healthy and different. On the appetizer list, the jumbo shrimp scampi over thin french fries is topnotch. So is the date stuffed with goat cheese and wrapped in prosciutto. Don’t miss dessert, especially the not-too-sweet cheesecake with a wonderfully dense texture, or the list of coffee drinks made with fair trade coffee. The live entertainment on Friday and Saturday nights is low key and does not overpower table conversation.