Chef Edoardo “Edo” Baldi’s new Tuscan steakhouse, Baldi at Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills, is officially open for dinner seven nights a week. Kim Fox

Business at Los Angeles restaurants typically slows down during the summer because it’s travel and cookout season for many customers. But as usual, chef Edoardo “Edo” Baldi will not be denied.

His buzzing new Tuscan steakhouse, Baldi at Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills, just expanded dinner service to seven nights a week after hearing guests clamor for the proper Baldi experience on Mondays and Tuesdays, which previously had a limited bar menu.

“A lot of people that were coming were like, ‘Oh, we want the full menu,’” Baldi tells Observer of the early week visitors. “I understand it, and I’m totally for it.”

Baldi is channeling his Tuscan upbringing at Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills as he grills prime cuts over olive wood. He is, as always, using time-honored recipes to make some of the most soul-warming pasta dishes in Los Angeles. He says that a big part of his success in L.A. has involved serving “health-conscious food,” so he’s also got beautiful salads and his famous minestrone with seasonal vegetables on the menu.

Baldi is part of a noteworthy summer revamp at the Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills. Jakob Layman

“What I’ve learned is to really understand the Los Angeles mentality,” says Baldi, who opened E. Baldi in Beverly Hills 20 years ago after seeing the success of his father’s Giorgio Baldi restaurant right off the Pacific Coast Highway. “I think about how to make a dish for people who are looking for something that’s healthier or vegetarian. You have to keep all those things in mind.”

Baldi at Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills is no doubt a meatery, but it’s also a deeply tomato-forward restaurant. Lobster linguine comes with an excellent spicy tomato sauce. Mezze maniche is bathed in an equally excellent tomato-based beef ragout that’s credited on the menu to “Sauro’s wife.” Sauro was Baldi’s father’s accountant and a close family friend in Italy.

“My education has not really been a book education, like where you go to culinary school,” Baldi says. “It’s been more about questioning people who do beautiful dishes that I enjoy eating and just learning through experience.”

Baldi has curated a menu that ensures there’s something for every type of diner. Jakob Layman

You can and should get a side of farmers market tomatoes with red onions to accompany your steak at Baldi. And steaks come with two sauces that are a nod to what Baldi’s mother used to serve alongside bagna càuda. One is a salsa verde with a little anchovy, egg white, parsley, salt, pepper, capers, olive oil, garlic and red wine vinegar. The other is tomato paste with a little garlic, sugar, salt and olive oil.

“I have several pictures from when I was little where I’m picking tomatoes,” says Baldi, who also has core memories of going with his mom to markets in Italy for produce and pastries.

Baldi’s steakhouse is part of a striking ready-for-the-summer dining makeover at Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills, which opened pan-Asian restaurant Gemma (with everything from crowd-pleasing butter chicken to har gow to lobster with Singaporean curry glass noodles) on its rooftop in May. And Baldi, who closed Edo Bites at Palisades Village after last year’s Palisades fire, understands revamps, renewal and rebirth more than most chefs.

His flagship E. Baldi in Beverly Hills is more popular than ever, even though it used to benefit from Hollywood expense-account budgets that no longer exist. What he realized along the way was that his restaurant had garnered a reputation as a power-lunch spot for the entertainment-industry elite, but that it was better to become a place for the masses.

“The restaurant has gained popularity with time,” Baldi says. “Before, it was more the business crowd. We’ve become more popular in the bigger picture. We get local clientele but also people from all over the world who are coming to Beverly Hills for a holiday.”

Baldi has long known that the restaurant business is inordinately challenging, but he’s eager to continue opening new restaurants while building on his legacy in Beverly Hills.

Baldi is using time-honored recipes to make some of the most soul-warming pasta dishes in Los Angeles. Jakob N. Layman

“There’s a saying my dad used to say all the time: ‘Even to your worst enemies, you wouldn’t want to convince them to open a restaurant,’” Baldi says. “Because the restaurant business is so difficult, right?”

Beverly Hills, for example, has seen the closure of prominent restaurants like Gucci Osteria da Massimo Bottura and Il Fornaio in the past year. And Daniel Boulud never opened his planned Café Boulud in the area.

“L.A. right now is having a very hard time,” Baldi says. “You read it everywhere. Restaurants are closing, and it’s a very negative outlook for the short-term future of restaurants. I’m not going to lie and tell you that I was for sure going to be successful at this hotel. You always have your worries. You can have a very good restaurant, but that doesn’t mean it will be successful. But besides being a chef, I love to create and I love to design. I think there’s much more ahead for me. I’m really looking forward to the future.”

He’s also looking forward to digging deeper into his family history as he gives Los Angeles new experiences.

“My dad built this brick, a so-called barbecue that didn’t even really work that well,” Baldi says about the earliest influence for his steakhouse. “But we used to grill meat all the time on Sundays. It was really so simple, just a little bit of olive oil, toss it on the grill, and eat it with tomatoes and onions and cannellini beans. I went back to the simplicity of how I used to eat meat.”

Baldi is located at 9850 Wilshire Blvd, Beverly Hills, CA 90210, and is open daily from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.