I spent a year living in New Zealand, and came back to Atlanta looking for the familiar and comforting tastes from the Southern Hemisphere - especially for the easy, local delicacy of meat pies. I found them at Heaps. It's a rare slice of New Zealand in Decatur, where Wellington native Jake Harvey and partner Ana turn local ingredients into golden, crimped pastries.
When he and his Danish wife, Majken Bech, opened Aimsir at the Cliff at Lyons in May 2019, they were a breath of fresh air. His food and her wine were exceptional, modern and cool in a way we had not seen before and - whisper it - haven't seen since, except perhaps at Comet, where Kevin O'Donnell and Laura Chabal achieve similar levels of edge on a much smaller budget.
The explosion of Dave's Hot Chicken will continue in Pinole on Friday, as the franchise opens its 387th store its 20th in the Bay Area. Gregg Fleury, owner of the Pinole location, opened his first Dave's franchise four years ago, and it was store No. 22. Now, we're No. 387, he said. It is insane, the growth of this concept. Dave's began in 2017 with a parking lot pop-up in East Hollywood.
The explosion of Dave's Hot Chicken will continue in Pinole on Friday, as the franchise opens its 387th store - its 20th in the Bay Area. Gregg Fleury, owner of the Pinole location, opened his first Dave's franchise four years ago, and it was store No. 22. "Now, we're No. 387," he said. "It is insane, the growth of this concept."
Rejoice, New Year's dieters: Oreos are getting a sugar-free option. Mondelez said Tuesday that Oreo Zero Sugar and Oreo Double Stuf Zero Sugar will go on sale in the U.S. in January. They're a permanent addition to the company's Oreo lineup. It's the first time Mondelez has sold sugar-free Oreos in the U.S. They're already sold in Europe and China, the company said.
Cake mix has many creative uses besides its intended dessert, from pie crusts to waffles. If you can't decide between cake or cookies, why not have a bit of both by transforming your cake mix into cookies with the help of cream cheese. Cake mix provides the dry ingredients and a base of sugar and flavors that takes the work out of making cookies from scratch.
According to the McDonald's U.K. website, it's possible to purchase toys separately, subject to availability and Fair Ordering policies. The Irish website echoes this sentiment, although expressly reserves the right to enforce only getting extra toys if you've bought a Happy Meal, and only allowing one additional toy per transaction.
Southern California is a great place to slurp ramen, according to Yelp, which released its list of Top 100 Ramen Shops for 2025 on Thursday, Dec. 11. Four Los Angeles County eateries made it into the top 20. Bincho in Tarzana tops the list. It opened in 2024 in space formerly occupied by Keitaro's Kitchen, a Japanese restaurant with the same chef, Toshiro Tagami. The results are based on Yelp data, which include the number of reviews and the ratings that reviewers give them.
Thick, chewy cinnamon- and cardamom-spiced snickerdoodles are fashioned as a version of thumbprint cookies here - with an indentation for a dollop of rich, smooth eggnog custard that flows over the cookie as it bakes. These two-in-one cookies channel holiday spices, and meld custard and snickerdoodle into its own dessert. Kirsten Mossberg's recipe for the cookie dough includes cream cheese for a delicate-but-sturdy texture and an added dimension of flavor.
Aussies know good steak. When you take a trip down under to Outback Steakhouse, you can be assured that every cut on the menu is going to be handled with care. A fact you should know about the restaurant is that it seasons all its steaks in its proprietary spice blend for all-over flavor before either searing or chargrilling them to the customer's temperature preference. Knowing this, it's hard to go wrong with any pick at the restaurant.
Baker Sharon Brenner achieves a fudgy texture partly by keeping a careful eye on indicators of doneness, which is a little more challenging with a darker cookie. One sign: Your kitchen will be filled with the scent of warm spices. The cookies will be set, but the edges shouldn't brown - check the bottoms for a more golden color than the tops.
Shots are the quickest way to get tequila down, but there's a way to actually enjoy the taste of tequila without trying to mask it with salt and lime juice. In an interview with Tasting Table, Jaime Salas, Head of Advocacy & Legacy for Jose Cuervo Tequila deemed the tried and true lime and salt duo "training wheels." But, says Salas, "while salt and lime are known as a dynamic duo when enjoying tequila shots, sangrita brings flavor contrast that still compliments the expression."
These delicate espresso shortbread cookies - a simple recipe with not too many ingredients - strike the perfect balance of coffee and brown butter. The brown butter has just enough caramel-y oomph to stand up to the espresso. Fiona Zhang says she bakes them so that they're fairly soft - 12 minutes in her oven - but for a snappier, crunchier cookie, they could stay in the oven for a couple minutes longer.
During tumultuous times, we look for comfort. And we often find it in our go-to dishes at our longtime favorite restaurants. But every year we say goodbye to many of those establishments. The ones we pay tribute to here had been landmarks for years, even generations. Some chefs and owners decided to retire or take a break. Others couldn't weather the costs of doing business in this inflationary, post-pandemic era. Or ran up against redevelopment plans.
Superfine Playa, Dina and chef Steve Samson's Playa Vista restaurant, will close on December 31, 2025; the restaurant confirmed the closure in a statement to Eater. This week's announcement is the latest closure in a year where a staggering number of prominent restaurants have ceased operations throughout the Southland. The couple's remaining restaurant, Rossoblu, will continue operations and serve Superfine Pizza on Sundays.
New York's tinned fish moment just got a very chic upgrade. Seirēn, a new conservas and cocktail bar dedicated entirely to the Iberian art of preserved seafood, opens today in Chelsea. But unlike the many spots that ignore the whole shimmering, briny universe by tucking a few sardines onto a board and calling it a day, this one is going all in.
Yang's Kitchen has been committed to thoughtful ingredient sourcing since opening in 2019, but its menu has flexed and changed over the years to meet the needs of diners, the business, and the moment. From its beef noodle soup beginnings to pandemic-era daytime fare, and finally the addition of evening dinner and wine service, every iteration has delivered the kind of flavors and comfort worth returning to time and again.
Our restaurant critic Bill Addison teamed up with longtime columnist Jenn Harris again this year to spread out and sample hundreds of different dining establishments - in addition to crucial return visits - to determine a range of 101 restaurants that exemplify everything we love about dining in Southern California. Read the entire guide below, plus our writers' favorite places to sip tea, coffee or cocktails, and the updated Hall of Fame list.
Ben & Jerry's may be the champion of unique ice cream flavors, but until now, it has rarely dabbled in new products outside the pint. While you can grab things like sundaes at Ben & Jerry's scoop shops, at the grocery store, new products are mostly limited to variations on form factors the company already offers, like the Ben & Jerry's Cores. That has left a lot of ice cream variations that people love, like ice cream sandwiches,
Many of these distilleries and their tasting rooms are set in pristine outdoor locations, and several also take advantage of the surrounding nature, using locally-sourced grain, snow melt or aquifer water, and endemic botanicals to celebrate local mountain life and the great outdoors. Pair a dram with soaring views and chic slope-side fashion, and aprés-ski in a mountain tasting room is more fun than a happy hour anywhere else. Below, our 10 favorite ski town distilleries in North America.
In-N-Out has reportedly kicked 67 out of its order system. According to a report from People Magazine, it removed the number because of the viral 6-7 trend. The fast food chain says kids and teenagers would wait around just to hear it called, and then jump into unruly 6-7 celebrations. Employees confirmed the number hasn't been used for orders for about a month. So now, the order system jumps from 66 straight to 68.
Vega Farms Inc., based in Dixon, issued the recall on Dec. 5 for its branded eggs sold in 12-count cartons and 30-count flats, CPDH officials said in a notice. The affected products, sold in the Sacramento and Davis areas, carry the handler code 2136 and include items supplied to restaurants and farmers markets. The recall covers cartons and flats marked with Sell By dates of Dec. 22, 2025, and earlier.
