#los-angeles-restaurants

#los-angeles-restaurants

One of Los Angeles's most popular underground dinners has finally landed a home after years in limbo. Chainsaw, which took off as a dinner pop-up/party in Karla Subero Pittol's Echo Park garage, is opening a cafe in the Melrose Hill neighborhood on November 13th. Expect the pies and ice cream Chainsaw is famous for, as well as arepas, pabellón criollo, and golden empanadas.

Maydan Market, a new culinary compound in Los Angeles's West Adams neighborhood, has proved itself worth the 6-year wait. D.C. restaurateur Rose Previte's food hall and market feels like an Avengers lineup of the city's best operators, with stalls from already-iconic Los Angeles restaurants such as Holy Basil (which introduced Yhing Yhang, a Thai barbecue counter); Poncho's Tlayudas (running Lugya'h, a crowd-drawing tlayuda joint); and Tamales Elena (whose Maléna slings tamales, weekend barbacoa, fried fish tacos, and more).

Spago in Los Angeles is the flagship in Wolfgang Puck's international empire a vital part of the city's culinary history, and represents possibly the greatest vibe shift ever in American restaurants. I went back several times because I wanted to see how this restaurant that, both influenced and anticipated some major American food trends over 40 years ago, fit into the scene it helped shape today.

I loved the mie tek tek (also known as mie goreng), a dish my wife and I would order regularly, but prepared much sharper and elegantly here on floral plateware and a tangle of microgreens garnish. The wok-fried noodles are well-sauced, seared ever so slightly, and tossed with fragments of tender chicken. Crunchy cabbage and chopped greens add additional texture, resulting in something sort of like chow mein but more dimensional.