Just as most people, I always have a jar of marinara and a box of spaghetti in my pantry. The brand I happen to have in stock at the moment is Barilla. It’s not always the case, but my point is that I’m never more than 15 minutes away from a pasta dinner. So when I heard that Casa Barilla—the restaurant arm of the Parma, Italy-based food brand that manufactured my current supply of pasta and sauce—opened in South Coast Plaza, I asked myself, “Why would I go to a restaurant to eat the same bowl of spaghetti I can make at home?”
If it were called anything else, I wouldn’t have the same reservations. Casa Barilla isn’t the first Italian fast-casual concept to start with premade sauces and dry pasta, but going in, I knew the kitchen would be using its factory-made products, because, well, why wouldn’t it? Because of this, there’s no mystery, no ambiguity and no presumption on my part that anyone at the restaurant slaved over a stove for hours making stuff from scratch.
