7 Numbers

Everyone wants to go home sometime in their lives.

Rosa Marinuzzi and her son, Vito, take you home every night to their restaurant 7 Numbers. Rosa is a wonderfully caring, warm, devoted person whose two loves are cooking and people. No one ever leaves her restaurant without an enormous hug and then a kiss. She touches your heart with her warmth and all the homemade food from her kitchen.

She arrives early in the morning and most days do not end until 11 p.m. or midnight. She is 60 and never misses a beat.Rosa's restaurant is made up of old kitchen chairs like the kind everyone's grandmother always had. The plates are mismatched, the décor is welcoming and the level of comfort goes beyond that of most restaurants. Everyone seems to care, from the waiters to the cooks to the customers. Laughter is the main sound one can hear at 7 Numbers.

Rosa keeps the food tasty and reasonably priced. Crunchy, garden-fresh green beans are delightful. Pan-fried New Zealand calamari, at $4, entices you to finish each morsel on your plate. Rosa does up Sea Scallops with a definite bite to them. The lasagna with spinach and ricotta is baked to perfection and the baked polenta is the best I have ever had outside of Italy.

The main courses are a tribute to this woman's years of cooking. They have a sexy duck leg for only $9, and she means sexy all right - in flavour. The fresh Tilapia fillet is delicious and the freshness and precision of the spices make diners smile for a long time.

Mario Cassano is a wine distributor who provides 7 Numbers with a wine from Italy called Casale. It brings the best out of Rosa's food.

There are two 7 Numbers, one at 343 Eglinton Ave. W., and the other at 307 Danforth Ave.

Rosa and her sons, Vito and Tony, are a family. Sometimes they disagree, but one thing they have in common is running restaurants.

Some people go looking for different things at restaurants. For me, 7 Numbers is a place to go back to again and again. The food, the wine and the people are incredible, but it is more than that. The sound that will always echo in my mind is that of laughter in a room filled with people. When I hear that sound, I know I am safe and where I belong. You can always hear that sound at 7 Numbers.

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