Gaetano's "La Famiglia" Menu

La Famiglia Night is every Tuesday starting at 5 p.m. at Gaetano's Restaurant in Torrance. The four course dinner feeds a family of 4 and the cost is a very reasonable charge of $50.00. The first thing you might think is that you would not have too many choices and that maybe, you just get the bare minimum. Well, I am here to prove you wrong.

It was my friend Sujata's birthday. I was not aware that it was Family night. The last time I was at Gaetano's, I had the Tasting Menu which was also reasonable for $23.00.  Though it was just the two of us I thought it would make sense to order the Family style dinner and just take the left overs home. We had several choices for the starters, soups or salad, pasta and entree.

For starters, we got to choose one for our party of 2. It had to be the Carciofi Fritti; artichoke hearts cooked in Parmesan bread crumbs served with ranch dressing. I have had this numerous times and totally love it. Sujata became a fan as well.  We had a choice of soup or salad for our second course. We both had soup, Sujata had the lentil (special of the day) and I had the minestrone soup which was nice and rich.

We got to pick a pasta dish for the table. We had the Shrimp Mediterranean; bowtie pasta with shrimps, sun dried tomatoes, roasted pine nuts, feta cheese, Parmesan in an olive oil-garlic sauce.
The entree we chose was the Eggplant Parmigiana which was delicious with their homemade marinara, mozzarella and ricotta. Needless to say, we did not finish everything. The left over could have fed two more hungry people.

When we could no longer eat anymore, we notice the background music started playing the song: "Happy Birthday" and along came 3 ladies singing along with a dish of spumoni for the birthday girl.  I loved it as it got everyone's attention, and Sujata (shy in nature) was so embarrassed.

The restaurant was quite busy. I guess word has gotten around about this great deal. Gaetano's is located at 2731 Pacific Coast Hwy. in Torrance, California.