Fraîche
What did the people at Sony do before downtown Culver City became home to two wine bars in every block? Jason Travi’s restaurant is clearly a locus of love and obsession, from the meticulous plateaux de mer that rival the majestic displays of shellfish at Parisian brasseries to Travi’s house-cured meats, from the careful juiciness of the Kurobuta pork chop with violet mustard to the subtle sweetness of the rabbit tortelli with brown butter. Longtime maitre d’/sommelier Thierry Perez has moved onto other projects, but so far, the restaurant is more or less unchanged. 9411 Culver Blvd., Culver City, (310) 839-6800, fraicherestaurantla.com. Open daily 5-10:30 p.m., bar open ’til mid. Full bar. Nearby parking in city lot. AE, MC, V.
Anne Fishbein
Beacon
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* Gjelina
Battered communal table? Sure. Fire pit in the patio? Of course. Wood-burning oven, IPA on tap, random cured meats and an interesting chandelier? This is Abbot Kinney — you might as well ask if the restaurant had doors. Gjelina is loud and crowded, the waiters are better-looking than you are and tables are difficult to reserve, but the difference between chef Travis Lett’s restaurant and the other small-plate joints on this newish restaurant row is that the food is actually good. Everybody may do a wood-oven pizza now, but Gjelina’s is thin, pliable and slightly burnt, topped with things like hen-of-the-woods mushrooms and English peas, or guanciale with crushed olives; while a mania for farmers market vegetables is also common on the Westside, Gjelina’s vegetable-intensive dishes, roasted Jerusalem artichokes or corn with arugula have a snap, a sweetness about them, and a seasonality specific enough that a farmers market devotee could probably tell you what week it was based on the garnishes on the chickpea plate alone. 1429 Abbot Kinney Blvd., Venice, (310) 450-1429, gjelina.com. Dinner nightly 5:30 p.m.-mid.; lunch Mon.-Fri., 11:30 a.m.-3 p.m.; brunch Sat.-Sun., 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. City lot behind restaurant.
Golden Deli
As iconic as the San Gabriel Mission, Golden Deli is a Vietnamese noodle shop whose imitators have spawned imitators, a mini-mall citadel of banh hoi and pho so popular that its customers wait up to an hour in the parking lot for a spot at one of the sticky, cramped tables. The prospect of Golden Deli’s bun thit, noodles tossed with fish sauce, grilled pork and fresh herbs, can do that to your judgment. There’s still no beer, but the restaurant did recently start accepting credit cards. Almost nothing on the long menu takes longer than a couple of minutes or so to cook and serve, and Subway offers more in the way of amenities. But Golden Deli has the best cha gio — fried Vietnamese spring rolls — in the observable universe, and the owners know it. After a bite or two, so will you. 815 W. Las Tunas Drive, San Gabriel, (626) 308-0803. Mon., Tues., Thurs., 9:30 a.m.-9 p.m., Fri., 9:30 a.m.-10 p.m., Sat., 9 a.m.-10 p.m., Sun., 9 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Closed August. No alcohol. Lot parking. Cash only.
* Golden State
As served at Golden State, an ale-intensive Fairfax gastropub whose owners would probably bite down on cyanide capsules before they would allow Miller Lite into their bar, the beer float is practically a sacrament: a scoop of splendid brown-bread ice cream from the cult gelateria Scoops, moistened gently with Old Rasputin Imperial Stout–caramelized intensity playing against caramelized intensity, a marriage of cold creaminess and explosive fizz, with a strong back taste that reminded a Russian friend of the fermented-bread drink kvass. The menu’s conceit is that everything comes from California and is grown as sustainably as possible. The hot dogs, served with things like roasted peppers, aïoli and grilled onions, come from Let’s Be Frank, and the sausages are from Huntington Meats, just down the street at the Farmers Market. The burger, made with aged Harris Ranch beef and Fiscalini cheddar, is among the best in town, especially if you order it rare. Golden State, in the vanguard of the new beer bar movement, may be centered around its ultrahopped, superboutique suds, but as a new institution in this heavily Jewish area, what it sells is really evolved chazzerai. 426 N. Fairfax Ave., L.A., (323) 782-8331, thegoldenstatecafe.com. Tues.-Sun., noon-10 p.m. Beer, wine. Street parking. MC, V.
Golden Triangle
Although Burma itself may not be a culinary destination, it makes a certain amount of sense that the country, snuggled between Thailand, Bangladesh and China, would have some interesting cooking of its own. Golden Triangle, steadfast in its patch of Uptown Whittier — even as its tone changed from bibliophile to skate rat — is the best place in California to taste Burmese food, a phantasmagoria of a cuisine that draws from the cooking of its neighbors, clarifying the flavors, perhaps, and adding a bit of homegrown funk. The restaurant specializes in the garbanzo flour–thickened catfish chowder called moh hin gha, the biryani-style rice dish called dun buk htaminh, and lap pad thoke, a salad made with pickled tea leaves that have the consistency of stewed collard greens and the caffeine kick of a double espresso. Sometimes you’ll run across a sour vegetable dish made with a special Burmese green that the owner grows in his backyard. Don’t leave without trying the incredible ginger salad: biting shreds of the spice tossed with an almost-too-crunchy mélange of coconut, fried garlic, fried yellow peas, peanuts and sesame seeds. If the world ever gave it a chance, ginger salad might have the universal appeal of spaghetti Bolognese. 7011 S. Greenleaf Ave., Whittier, (562) 945-6778. Open daily 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Beer, wine. Street and lot parking. AE, D, MC, V.
