I SHOWED UP early on a Thursday evening to attempt my first dinner at Osteria Mozza, less than a year after the restaurant opened in mid-2007. Reservations were impossible; two friends and I could only pray for a few open seats held for walk-in diners at the mozzarella bar. We snagged them, miraculously. Ribbed garganelli trapping lush ragù Bolognese, the famous raviolo with its self-creating sauce of oozing yolk, braised meats we cut with spoons and a dessert that included fragrant peaches hinting of roses all flicker as memory fragments. What I recall with total clarity is the presence of Nancy Silverton, who stood at the bar’s center. The dining room’s crowd contained famous faces if you looked hard enough, but Silverton was a star in her own right. She kept a force field of concentration around her, smiling enigmatically and staying in constant motion. Her plates of cheese and condiments were notions of Sicilian crudo, or even Nikkei-style sashimi, rendered in dairy. Pairings gave alliums — fried leeks, grilled spring onions, garlic as subtle as a pheromone — center-stage status. She employed peppery olive oil as an acid; no vinegar needed. The variations on mozzarella seemed to defy nature’s laws in their suspension between cream and cheese. Everything was extraordinary.

Osteria Mozza, under the current guidance of culinary director Liz Hong, heralded the decade when Los Angeles became one of the world’s most exciting dining cultures. Silverton is a global culinary ambassador these days. I haven’t seen her behind the bar in years. Still, when mozzarella di bufala meets the papery cruschi peppers that almost rustle against the teeth, and the yolk bleeds into the brown butter under the raviolo, I feel the same Mozza excitement. More than 15 years since its debut, a little is lost but a whole lot remains.

• 6602 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, (323) 297-0100, osteriamozza.com