Stella, the West Hollywood hot spot that chef Rob Gentile and restaurateur Janet Zuccarini opened at the former Madeo space in late February, is a grand, ambitious, over-the-top undertaking. It’s an Italian restaurant that’s purposefully unlike any other Italian restaurant in Los Angeles. Gentile is serving hyper-specific regional pastas. He’s hewing to tradition and channeling childhood memories. But he’s also here to discover new ingredients and come up with new crowd-pleasing bangers.

“We always look for something that's going to make a wow impression on someone who's maybe never had it,” says Gentile, who’s cooking ingredients like chayote squash vines and Ibérico pork pluma for the first time.