Eric Greenspan

Student Wins Settlement in Lawsuit Against Le Cordon Bleu in Pasadena

It's been a long road in the dispute between the parent companies of Le Cordon Bleu in Pasadena and the students who filed a class action suit alleging fraud against the culinary school. According to the claim, LCB misled prospective students into thinking they would secure jobs post graduation with ... More >>

Tim Walker: The Grilled Cheese King

One of the fascinating Angelenos featured in L.A. Weekly's People 2013 issue. Check out our entire People 2013 issue here. On a sunny Saturday afternoon in Glendale, Tim Walker stands outside the Grilled Cheese Truck, describing its signature sandwich to a prospective customer the way a proud paren ... More >>

Happy Grilled Cheese Sandwich Month Free Sandwiches

President Obama declared April "Budget Responsibly" Month yesterday. April also happens to be Grilled Cheese Sandwich Month. Unbeknownst to San Francisco-based The Melt (with a location downtown), their grilled cheese sandwich giveaway will cover both bases -- looking out for both your wallet and yo ... More >>

Video: The Foundry's Eric Greenspan Explains the Secret of Great Grilled Cheese

So, apparently YouTube has a food channel called Tasted. Who knew? And they do tons of programing, mainly in the Food Network/Bravo style -- that is to say, jaunty music, quick-cut editing and shows with names like Dude Food. One such show, Star Chef Secrets, this week features Eric Greenspan of T ... More >>

Chefs' Worst Kitchen Injuries: More Fun Behind the Stoves

Cooking can be dangerous, as anyone who has spent much time in a kitchen can attest to. Now consider the hazards of a career surrounded by flames, super heated liquids and sharp objects. So we queried some notable area chefs (Ricardo Zarate! Michael Voltaggio! Eric Greenspan!) for the stories behin ... More >>

The Year In Food Interviews

One of the beautiful things about journalism, not unlike therapy, is that you get to talk to people about themselves. In this case, we have the enormous privilege of being able to take our notepads and recorders and iPhones into the kitchens and restaurants -- or hotel lobbies and neighborhood coffe ... More >>

Top 5 Weekend Food Events: Winter Cocktails, Latkes, Caviar, Tasting Menus, Recovery

Winter Cocktail Launch Bartender Jaymee Mandeville's unveils her seasonal cocktail lineup featuring warming libations like Breaking Castagne (cognac, mezcal, housemade chestnut syrup, mole bitters and nutmeg), Grimhilda (apple brandy, chipotle honey, pama and lemon) and Remedy X (rosemary-infused wh ... More >>

Top 10 Food-Related Lawsuits of 2011

Taco BellTaco Bell gives thanks for being sued over the contents of its meat​A look at this year through the lens of the food-related lawsuits is like watching the first season of The Killing: an exercise in frustration, bewilderment, and, occasionally, excitement. From the mother who sued N ... More >>

Ashley James' Cuisine Culture: From Four Seasons Beverly Hills to PBS

Kathy A. McDonaldTelegenic chef Ashley James with hotel garden-grown tomatoes​You've heard of the casting couch, how about the casting kitchen? Fresh from behind the stove, L.A. chefs, with their proximity to TV producers, seem to have a lock on new TV food shows this year. Ludo and Krissy Lef ... More >>

Eric Greenspan's New Restaurant-Bar-Hangout: The Roof on Wilshire

Photo by Kathy A. McDonaldChef Eric Greenspan at his new spot, The Roof on Wilshire​ The Roof on Wilshire is Eric Greenspan's new restaurant, sort of. It's a bar, but not really. It's both, but neither. "It's a hangout," Greenspan says, which really is the best way to describe it. Situated on ... More >>

Super Secret Grilled Cheese Ingredient Revealed: Or, WTF Is A Miven?

Anna WooMolten Marshmallow Peep Guts​One thing is for sure: the husband and wife team of attorney Brian Beecher and schoolteacher Crystal Beecher, a/k/a, "The Mivens" won't ever tell you what the hell their secret ingredient, "Mivens" is, no matter how insistently you beg, threaten, wheedle a ... More >>

Q & A with Chef Sean Ehland, Part 1: From Culinary High Schooler to Noma Stagier

Photo by Shauna Miller​It seems some chefs just can't sit still these days. As Jonathan Gold mused in A Movable Beast, it's no longer essential that chefs simply keep to their kitchen. We have chefs who pop up, chefs who make guest appearances, chefs who get in trucks and roam the streets. Now ... More >>

Le Cordon Bleu Changes Curriculum, Reduces Tuition: But is it a Good Deal?

​Changes are on the horizon for the curriculum at Le Cordon Bleu culinary school. Come the end of this month, LCB will offer students the option to enroll in a 12-month culinary certificate program, foregoing the associates degree that was previously required. According to an email from Mark ... More >>

Eric Greenspan Pops Up at Tart, For Brunch

Anne FishbeinChef Eric Greenspan.​If you haven't had enough of brunch after Mother's Day, grilled cheese maestro and Foundry chef/owner Eric Greenspan will be throwing a pop-up brunch at Tart, May 13th-15th. The fancily renovated in-house restaurant of the Farmers Daughter motel will play home ... More >>

A Recipe From the Chef: Eric Greenspan's "The Champ" Grilled Cheese

A. TrachtaThe sexiest damn grilled cheese you've ever seen.​Sure, there are quick and dirty versions of the grilled cheese. You can melt something yellow between two buttered buns in less than 5 minutes. But where's the payoff there? Let's take it slow. Make it worth our while. If we learned o ... More >>

L.A.'s Top 10 Sunday Suppers Tender Greens Kicks Off Sunday Beer Garden

Photos by Anne FishbeinMeals from Lucques (left), Church & State (middle) and Palate (right).​This weekend, Tender Greens in Hollywood will kick off its first Sunday beer garden, a monthly event with all-you-can-eat roasted meat and all-you-can-drink craft beer for a flat fee of $35. (We had a ... More >>

Short Attention Span Dinner Theater: Your Week in Food, 4/18-4/22

Flickr/Lauren Manning​ In which we highlight the past week in food, either at home or abroad. "As Sotto, the new Italian restaurant from Steve Samson and Zack Pollack, who ran David Meyer's Pizza Ortica at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, somebody sprung to fix up the basement, because it is ... More >>

Q & A with Eric Greenspan, Part 2: Culinary School or Not Culinary School, Etc.

Photo by Felicia Friesema.​In Part 1 of our interview with Eric Greenspan, we discovered that The Foundry on Melrose is somehow a tight ship and a wild ride at the same time. The chef waxed poetic (and, well, dropped a lot of f-bombs) as he discussed the challenges of owning a restaurant, the ... More >>

Q & A with Eric Greenspan, Part 1: Chef-as-Owner, The Grilled Cheesery Humanizing Fine Dining

Photo by Felicia Friesema.Eric Greenspan in his open kitchen at The Foundry on Melrose.​It's noon on Wednesday at The Foundry on Melrose and the phones are ringing off the hook. The house line is buzzing relentlessly, as is chef/owner Eric Greenspan's cell. Mostly it's staff calling with quest ... More >>

2011 Grilled Cheese Invitational Tix On Sale: New Category, More Pro Chefs

Guzzle & NoshScenes from the 2010 Grilled Cheese Invitational​Tim Walker will stop the world to melt with you. The Pope of Cheeseville is working hard to make sure the 2011 Grilled Cheese Invitational (@grilldcheez) is bigger and cheesier than ever. Tickets go on sale today for the annual gril ... More >>

The Foundry Hosts Top Chef Casting Call

Photo by Felicia FriesemaChef Eric Greenspan​The Foundry on Melrose will be ground zero for celebrity chef wannabes as the restaurant hosts a casting call for Top Chef on Monday, March 14th between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. The casting call is double duty. Producers will be looking both for season 9 ... More >>

Where to Dine Out For Thanksgiving: 10 Restaurants For Traditionalists

Napa Valley Grille/Lisa Cohen​ Sitting in a restaurant for Thanksgiving might not be your tradition (yet), but remember that it's the really best of both worlds: You get to eat your turkey (and often cake, too), and someone else will clean up. In some cases, you'll even have leftovers for tha ... More >>

Pot and Food: How Prop 19 Could Affect the Restaurant Business

N. GalutenA marijuana dispensary in a former Kentucky Fried Chicken​ UPDATE: Since Proposition 19's defeat on Tuesday, we checked in with Animal chef Jon Shook to get his take. Shook told us, "I personally feel like if we couldn't pass gay marriage, and we were able to pass Prop 19, then we ar ... More >>

Dogfish Head Beer Lunch At The Foundry

Felicia FriesemaEric Greenspan in the kitchen at The Foundry​ If you're bored silly this Sunday afternoon, or maybe so hungover from Jonathan Gold's Speakeasy Cocktail Party that you still have your cocktalian suspenders and cloche hat on (don't want to know), you might consider wandering over ... More >>

Pie-A-Day Contest 2010: 234 Pies, An Apron Show, But No Pie Throwing (Yet)

Good Food blogDelilah Snell's (The Road Less Traveled) mixed berry pie​ The end of another Los Angeles summer, the end of another season of pies for Evan Kleiman. Kleiman (Angeli Caffe, Good Food) has closed her second Pie-A-Day contest and will judge the entries this Sunday, September 5th, a ... More >>

Eva: Intimate Bistro, Epic Meals

A place for regulars, at regular prices

LA Weekly Journalists Recognized At Southern California Journalism Awards In Downtown Los Angeles

Anderson Cooper.​LA Weekly took home several awards, including Best Website for a News Organization, at the Los Angeles Press Club's 52nd Annual Southern California Journalism Awards gala, held at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel downtown Sunday night. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger gave a speech a ... More >>

Tom Leykis and Adam Leemon: A Perfect Pairing

Your Grilled Cheese Update: This Weekend's Invitational Eric Greenspan's New Sandwich Stand

​A reminder that The Grilled Cheese Invitational is this Saturday afternoon. Thousands of people (last year's crowd numbered over 5,000). Thousands of sandwiches. Hundreds of thousands of calories, as if we cared. And if you're still standing -- and still hungry -- on Sunday, Eric Greenspan, ... More >>

If It's Tuesday ... It Must Be the Foundry

Ask Mr. Gold: If It's Tuesday... It Must Be The Foundry

Photo credit: Anne FishbeinMr. Gold, with dim sum menu​Dear Mr. Gold: I like go out in the middle of the week, but I'm afraid to walk into a dead, empty restaurant. In the harsh reality of a slow night it can feel like an odd, cheerless, hopeless encounter with all that's wrong with the univer ... More >>

More Fun With Fried Chicken: Ludo Pops Up at Akasha

LA Weekly Flickr pool/djjewelzLudo Lefebvre's fried chicken​ At the rate he's going, chef Ludo Lefebvre (LudoBites) may never need to open his own restaurant: he can just guest chef at this friends' restaurants. After Akasha Richmond went to the fried chicken dinner that Lefebvre and Eric Gree ... More >>

Playing Chicken at The Foundry: Chefs Ludo and Greenspan Cook a Chicken Dinner

​If two chefs feel like cooking together, maybe matching their different versions of a dish up for an evening of good food, they do not necessarily need a glitzy Kitchen Stadium and a bunch of Food Network TV cameras to do so. Sometimes one chef can just drop into another's restaurant, cook, h ... More >>

The Week in Weirdos

Ludo Pops Up in a Truck: 1 Day, 1 Dish at LA Street Food Fest

If you need another fix of LudoBites, chef Ludovic Lefebvre's wandering restaurant (Breadbar, Royal/T), you have a one-shot chance next weekend. Ludo will be popping u--in a truck--at next weekend's LA Street Food Fest. Not only is this a one shot deal, it's also one dish. Lefebvre will be serving f ... More >>

The Giving Tree: dineLA Restaurant Week 2010 and L.A. Chef "Family Tree"

Start putting your restaurant wish list together and get ready to dial reservation lines. The restaurants participating in the winter '10 round of dineLA have been announced and getting all your ducks (hopefully confit) in a row to take advantage of the semi-annual deal can be a frenzied process. Re ... More >>

Eric Greenspan Dishes on The Next Iron Chef: No Spoilers, No Grasshoppers, Part 2

When last we checked in with Eric Greenspan, chef-owner of The Foundry on Melrose and the first chef (and only Los Angeles contestant) to be eliminated in The Next Iron Chef, there were seven contestants. Now there are four (imagine an Agatha Christie story, in a locked kitchen). Last week, Dominiqu ... More >>

Top 10 Grilled Cheese Sandwiches: A Loaf of Bread, A Pound of Cheese...

Not just your plain-Jane American cheese on toast anymore, the grilled cheese sandwich is both comfort food and cultural icon. Proving that you can do an awful lot with a few slices of bread and a hunk of cheese. From a lavish raisin bread with shortribs and tallegio to a simple aged Cheddar and tom ... More >>

The James Beard Foundation's Invitational: Food and Cocktails Duke It Out

From 6:30 p.m. until the lights rose at 2:00 a.m. this past Monday (well, Tuesday), Squid Ink put in a full work day at The James Beard Foundation's L.A. Chef Invitational at The Foundry. As enjoyable as the evening was, good food and classic cocktails are difficult to mix. Eric Greenspan noted th ... More >>

Eric Greenspan Dishes on The Next Iron Chef: No Spoilers, No Grasshoppers

When Eric Greenspan of The Foundry on Melrose was eliminated in the first round of this season's The Next Iron Chef, the only Los Angeles chef in the contest left the building--or the kitchen. Since Greenspan's elimination, the ranks have been culled further: second to go was Holly Smith (Cafe Juani ... More >>

James Beard Foundation LA Chef Invitational At The Foundry: Eat, Drink, Repeat

A fairly high percentage of L.A.'s finer dining restaurants are closed on Mondays. Next Monday that's probably a good thing, as not a few of them will be at The Foundry on Melrose. Eric Greenspan, chef-owner of The Foundry, will be hosting The James Beard Foundation L.A. Chef Invitational, a 5-cours ... More >>

The Next Iron Chef: The First Chef Off The Kitchen Island

It's a safe bet that grasshoppers will not be on the menu at The Foundry at Melrose, now or ever. Eric Greenspan, the only Los Angeles chef on this season's The Next Iron Chef, which is set in LA, was eliminated in the first round yesterday. The 10 chefs were each given a difficult ingredient (sea ... More >>

Next Iron Chef Eric Greenspan: Will The Foundry's Cuisine Reign Supreme?

After stints in the kitchens of Alain Ducasse, Rocco Despirito, David Bouley and Ferran Adria, the jocular Eric Greenspan made a quick leap from sous chef to executive chef at Joachim Splichal's Patina, then opened a place of his own, The Foundry on Melrose, two years ago at age 32. Now the culinar ... More >>

Food Fight: the Foundry VS. Father's Office

Chefs Eric Greenspan and Sang Yoon Engage in a Battle of the Burgers

Short Attention Span Dinner Theater: Your Week in Food

In which we highlight the past week in food, either at home or abroad. "The positive growth in summer employment is one indicator of the likely beginning of economic recovery for the restaurant industry." National Restaurant Association Releases Industry Employment Outlook for Summer of 2009. ... More >>

Eric Greenspan's 95 Theses: A Hamburger Challenge, Nailed to the Father's Office Doors, in Ketchup

The FoundryBattle of the burgersEarly this morning, 2 a.m. to be precise, Eric Greenspan issued a hamburger challenge to LA's reigning hamburger king, Sang Yoon of Father's Office. Greenspan, chef-owner of The Foundry on Melrose, staged what can only be called a covert food op, nailing his challenge ... More >>

The Raw, the Cooked and Everything in Between: Taste of the Nation

The raw and the cooked--and everything in between--were showcased at Share Our Strength's Taste of the Nation fundraiser event in Culver City on Sunday. Many of the participating local chefs were big on crudo, while others preferred carbonizing their protein. The sheer number of chefs and food busin ... More >>

Brick's Picks: Tigran Hamasayan, Kneebody, Nels Cline and more

The Patina of Youth

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The G Spot (Sans the Pleasure)