Daniel Patterson's more relaxed fine-dining return is the chef's answer to how L.A. wants to eat

Jacaranda is Daniel Patterson’s first return to fine-dining cooking in a decade, offering a violet-lit, Gen-X soundtrack and a dinner-party feel. The Hollywood restaurant is run with one seating per day, encouraging guests to linger after a 10-course, $295 tasting menu. Patterson’s wife, Sarah Lewitinn, welcomes guests in ballgowns and mixes humor with candid conversation. The service is less formal than Patterson’s earlier work at San Francisco’s Coi, where he built a reputation for acclaimed tasting menus. Patterson frames the shift as a response to how Los Angeles wants to experience high-level dining, blending high and low elements. He also reflects on stepping away from Coi, launching other projects, and focusing on personal healing and calmer creativity.

"Jacaranda is Daniel Patterson's first return in 10 years to cooking in a fine-dining kitchen. It's also, he says, a little more like a dinner party. It's certainly less formal than San Francisco's Coi, where he made his name and served one of the country's most acclaimed tasting menus. His wife, former music journalist and producer Sarah Lewitinn, welcomes guests to the new Hollywood restaurant. She's often dressed in a ballgown and just as often outspoken, cracking jokes or spilling kitchen secrets as she converses with every table. With only one seating each day, guests are encouraged to linger past their 10-course, $295 tasting menus."

"The price is formal, but the more casual service reflects the evolution of Patterson's cooking as well as where he thinks fine dining might be headed. With more socializing and a less-stuffy environment, Jacaranda, he says, is tailored to the way he thinks L.A. wants to enjoy high-level dining: That mix of high-low, he says, has proved "a revelation." "I was really lucky to be part of a generation that did a lot to change how people cook, and Coi did a lot of that," Patterson says. "My question was: What does fine dining look like in 2026?""

"Patterson stepped away from his chef duties at Coi in 2016 (though he retained ownership until its 2022 closure) in order to launch Locol in Watts with Roy Choi and later Alta in West Adams with Keith Corbin. In his years away from the world of high-end tasting menus, he dedicated time to "inner healing" after years of channeling his energy and angst into the kitchen, chasing what he called "lightning bolt moments." Older and calmer, he worried his creativity might suffer w"

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