Marea will make its West Coast debut with its official opening in Beverly Hills on Thursday, Jan. 16. Originally, there was discussion about a ribbon-cutting and a glamorous grand opening for the second U.S. location of the Italian seafood restaurant that was born in New York 15 years ago. But the playbook for everything in Los Angeles has changed in the wake of the devastating wildfires that have destroyed more than 12,000 structures, including the Pacific Palisades home of Marea co-chef de cuisine Travis Passerotti. So Marea, which has been conducting preview dinners and soft-opening service in recent weeks, has offered free to-go meals for first responders every day since Jan. 10.
On Tuesday Jan. 14, I went to dine at Marea’s new location, and caught a glimpse of Passerotti amiably chatting with guests in the dining room before he ran back into the kitchen to deal with orders for a busy restaurant that had a packed bar, a main dining area that filled up quickly after 7:30 p.m. and a private dining room occupied by more than 20 female business leaders, including Jessica Alba.
The night was a reminder that restaurants are vital gathering places in times of crisis; that they are transporting escapes; that they provide comfort and luxury and respite; that they are a reason many of us choose to live in big cities and will continue to do so.
Marea’s Beverly Hills location, led by founder/CEO Ahmass Fakahany and executive chef PJ Calapa, is a stacked operation. There are two chefs de cuisine with serious Los Angeles bona fides: former Tasting Kitchen head chef Passerotti and Rossoblu/Bestia alum Amaury Tafolla.
“That was the most imperative thing for me when we were in the hiring process,” Calapa tells Observer. “They needed to be local. They needed to come up through here. They needed to understand this city. It was very important to me that the team that was the boots on the ground already had connections with the farmers and the cheesemakers and the bread people. And now we have this opportunity to build this beautiful restaurant and help all these small purveyors who make beautiful things, and hopefully it all helps everyone out.”
The restaurant industry is, of course, about creating a community during the good times and also the terrible times.
“These kinds of things were in my head well before the fires,” Calapa says. “We’ve been through Covid and we’ve been through Sandy and we’ve been through 9/11 and all these tragedies. From our perspective, this idea of working together, working more closely with other people that are in the area, makes even more sense now.”
Marea serves some of its longtime hits, like sea urchin with lardo crostini and handmade fusilli with octopus and bone marrow, in Beverly Hills. But most of my dinner on Tuesday consisted of new, Los Angeles-specific dishes. Rockfish crudo with calamansi and pistachio powder paired perfectly with Marisa Cuomo ravello bianco that sommelier Jesse Penwarden poured. The crudo (Calapa likes how rockfish works nicely for thick slices) and its elements revealed the bounty of California while the fruity and floral Amalfi Coast wine and the yacht-evoking design of the dining area made our table feel like we were sailing around Southern Italy.
Other standout new dishes at Marea in Beverly Hills include a halved avocado filled with spot prawn tartare.
“It’s a California avocado,” Calapa says. “We peel it, we burn the outside, so it looks like it’s still in the shell. And we make this beautiful tartare with Santa Barbara spot prawns. I wanted it to be a play on if you were, you know, going to a wedding in Beverly Hills in the ‘60s and there was the old prawn cocktail.”
Pappardelle with Dungeness crab is another showcase for local seafood.
“Local crabs make it really beautiful,” Calapa says. “Clear crab stock, so it keeps it nice and clean. Simple but really delicious flavors, baby leeks and a little bit of chiles and lemon. I want to really focus on these kinds of cleaner, more delicate flavors for the pastas.”
As I looked around Marea on Tuesday, I started texting hospitality-industry friends who know they’re facing an uncertain future in Los Angeles. I told them all three tables next to me ordered Dover sole (so did I), and that guests were happily drinking $34 martinis, and that there were people here on dates, and people who were speaking Japanese and people who came to sit alone at the bar. I told them this to remind them that restaurants are about special occasions, but also about everyday revelry.
They’re also about long-term bets. Fakahany, who was formerly president and COO of Merrill Lynch, has taken his time with expansion and studied the Beverly Hills market. This new restaurant has been three years in the making. Marea (which original chef Michael White departed during the pandemic) has remained a New York powerhouse and is eyeing new global expansion despite setbacks like water damage that forced it to temporarily close in New York.
“As Covid was ending, we had this horrific flood where 18 floors of hot water fell on us from upstairs in the building,” Fakahany tells Observer.” We had to shut the restaurant for four months and refurbish it. I wanted to test the strength of the brand after Covid. And as they say in business, ‘Never waste a crisis.” We beautified the restaurant. We made it younger, more interesting. We wanted to come to LA in a position of strength.”
Marea in Beverly Hills wants to make a point of being a place where you can enjoy dinner and then stay late. Fakahany would love to have a restaurant that becomes a 10 p.m. destination. So beyond dinner and the forthcoming lunch service Marea plans to launch in the near future, Fakahany is thinking about nightcaps in multiple ways.
“I’ve walked the neighborhood many times in the evening, and there are not many places to go to have a beautiful cocktail and a little bite, a crudo, a little red prawn, something that’s tasty and can cap out your night,” he says. “And I think there could be demand for that. What we imagine is that our bar area can be very much a buzzy vibrant rendezvous place.”
I can see that happening. Fakahany and his team have built an alluring restaurant that makes you want to come back for all kinds of reasons and occasions. Before we even finished dinner on Tuesday, a dining companion booked another reservation at Marea. An hour later, still thinking about the excellent vongole sauce atop the Dover sole I ate, I booked one, too.
