99 Things to Eat in L.A. Before You Die

The dish of seafood marinated in lime juice and vinegar is ubiquitous in Los Angeles, a star of trucks and mariscos stands, fusion sushi bars and sticky seafood restaurants. And then there's the Peruvian seviche at Mo-Chica: cubes of sushi-quality tuna in a thick vinegar emulsion sharp with chile, soft and tart and brutally spicy all at once, served with slivered red onion, a half-ear of giant-kerneled corn and a soft chunk of sweet potato. Since Nobu Matsuhisa blew into town 20-odd years ago, high-quality Peruvian seafood has not been hard to find in Los Angeles, but this is earthier, more sensual, more Peruvian, speaking as much of the mountains as of the sea. Mo-Chica, in Mercado La Paloma, 3655 S. Grand Ave., L.A. (213) 747-2141.

The famous sandwich is probably the only good thing to have come out of a century of colonialism in Vietnam: a warm, freshly baked baguette stuffed with pickled vegetables, soft liver pâté, and a deli counter's worth of sliced Vietnamese charcuterie. The sandwich adapts well to standardization. The old-line stores have premade sandwiches stacked like firewood behind the counter in anticipation of the lunch break. The new banh mi superstores have bakeries on-premises, drive-through windows, and advanced video-ordering systems — some of them sell 10,000 sandwiches every day. The Mr. Baguette stores may have all the technology of their competitors, but their sandwiches taste as if they were made by humans. Mr. Baguette makes its own high-quality ham and headcheese and steamed pork loaves, its soft, luscious pâté has a mildly gamy tang — and for a quarter extra, the sandwich comes frosted with toasted sesame seeds. Mr. Baguette, several locations, including 400 S. Atlantic Blvd., Monterey Park (626-282-9966) and 8702 E. Valley Blvd., Rosemead (626-288-9166).

PHOTO BY ANNE FISHBEIN

PHOTO BY ANNE FISHBEIN

Border Grill's green corn tamales

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Casa Bianca Pizza Pie

1650 Colorado Blvd.
Eagle Rock, CA 90041

Category: Restaurant > Italian

Region: Northeast L.A.

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The conceit of serving foie gras with a mere fruit compote has become a little dusty as of late: all the hot chefs are serving it with eels or in jars, glazed with Coca-Cola or encased in cotton candy. The sweet taste of cruelty may be no longer enough. Animal — which already serves the liver as part of its crazed version of the Big Island drive-in classic Hawaiian concoction, loco moco — a beef patty with white rice, gravy and eggs — steps up the battle by putting its seared foie gras on top of truckstop–standard biscuits with maple-sweetened sausage gravy, and the aesthetic of fat-on-fat-on-fat is successful in ways I can't begin to understand. Animal, 435 N. Fairfax Ave., L.A. (323) 782-9225.

Like Los Angeles, Mérida is a sprawling multicultural city, temperate in climate, geographically cut off from the rest of Mexico, whose trade ties to foreign capitals are in some ways stronger than the ones to its own. Its cooking has always resonated here — not least the panuchos: split, bean-stuffed tortillas, panfried crisp, which juxtapose the round meatiness of well-done roast pork against the slight creaminess of pureed black beans, are drizzled with citrus, and are garnished with tart, pickled onions dyed scarlet with beets. Like many cross-cultural phenomena, panuchos are best sluiced with the hottest habanero salsa you can bear. Chichen Itza, in Mercado La Paloma, 3655 S. Grand Ave., L.A. (213) 741-1075.

In the dusty sands of time, I remember pad Thai as tasty, even thrilling: stiff bundles of rice pasta slicked with orange oil, oversweetened with palm sugar, sprinkled with peanut dust and plopped on top of a mass of bean sprouts. Mmmm — peanut dust. Not so much later, I recall, a woman broke up with me because I insisted on ordering pad Thai every time we went to the old Chao Praya, citing it as proof of my severe lack of imagination. (In my defense, Chao Praya's pad Thai was an awfully good plate of noodles.) But the ultra-spicy, tamarind-soured, fish-sauce-laced house-special version at Krua Thai is about as good as pad Thai gets, a powerful dish that retains some of the exoticism bred out of it by a thousand inferior versions, sweet and squiggly and delicious, stocked with both tofu and big shrimp — the dish made vivid again after decades as a cliché. Krua Thai, 13130 Sherman Way, N. Hlywd. (818) 759-7998.

"Ancient ginger" is what happens when that node you forgot to use from last week's stir-fry languishes, forgotten, beneath the garlic and onions. Ancient ginger soup is a double-strength soup zapped with this withered, magically pungent ginger, soothing and powerful — if deli chicken soup is Jewish penicillin, this stuff is Chinese Cipro. Toss in a handful of soft rice noodles and a portion of simmered chicken, cooked just to the point beyond pinkness, and you've got the only ancient Chinese secret you need. Noodle Island, 800 W. Las Tunas Drive, San Gabriel. (626) 293-8839.

Chard pictures don't light up Facebook feeds, and chard discussions do not clutter the airwaves. When they come across chard in your weekly CSA box, your children are unlikely to yelp with delight — in fact, what they do say probably sounds a lot like the French word for the vegetable, which happens to be blette. Still: chard, how delicious! The organic rainbow chard from the McGrath stand at the farmers market does not have the glamour of the farm's strawberries or tomatoes, but manages to pack all the sweet earthiness of the fabled Oxnard Plain into a few square inches of leaf. McGrath Family Farms, at the Wednesday and Saturday Santa Monica Farmers Market and the Sunday Hollywood Farmers Market. mcgrathfamilyfarm.com.