Studio City

Girasol's Two Stars: Readers Respond to Besha Rodell's Review

5 Best L.A. Bars to Eat, Drink and Watch UK Soccer

For a small but vocal minority in L.A., the new UK soccer season starting in early August means waxing the elbow and gearing up for some very early morning starts -- and that's if you can even find a place to see the match live on the big screen. You can get almost anything online of course, but not ... More >>

Now Open: Girasol in Studio City

Girasol, a new 120-seat restaurant in Studio City from Top Chef alum C.J. Jacobson, opens today. Jacobson, who recently returned from an apprenticeship at Noma in Copenhagen, Denmark, got involved with Girasol because he felt it was a unique addition to the neighborhood. "I get to showcase my take o ... More >>

Black Market Liquor Bar: Embittering Ventura Boulevard

You make reasonable assumptions about what you're going to drink depending on where you are. You don't go to Manhattan Beach to drink scotch, any more than you would Ensenada; you expect something more beachy there, in a tropical, caipirinha-colada vein perhaps. In Silver Lake you may be able to ord ... More >>

Taye Diggs Takes Down Burglary Suspect Hassan Juma, L.A. Cops Say

Updated at the bottom with Juma charged. First posted at 12:19 p.m. Monday. A burglar chose the wrong home last night, cops say. No, it wasn't LL Cool J's place. This time the residence belonged to Taye Diggs: Cops say the actor, who had been at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, came home to find 20 ... More >>

Angelenos Focus on the Important Issues on Election Day: Trying to Hook Up

As the nation came together to determine the course of our nation for the next four years, some Angelenos headed to their designated polling place looking to do a little "polling" of their own, if you know what we mean (we mean having sex). Missed Connections lit up as woeful would-be suitors atte ... More >>

DUI Checkpoints in Downtown Los Angeles, Studio City

The LAPD will wrap up summer with a pair of DUI checkpoints. One of them is near Staples Center and the other is in Studio City. While we sometimes question the department's placement of such dragnets (they never seem to happen L.A.'s wealthier enclaves), we give the cops credit for this much: At ... More >>

Turns Out LL Cool J Is Hard as Hell

A would-be burglar picked the wrong house this morning and the suspect was met with the fists of fury of one LL Cool J, who had in fact warned us via classic rap songs that he's "hard as hell" and that his "mama said knock you out." That's reportedly what happened to the intruder, who cops told the ... More >>

66: Pastrami Reuben at Art's Delicatessen

Leading up to this year's Best of L.A. issue (due out Oct. 4), we'll be counting down, in no particular order, 100 of our favorite dishes. 66: Pastrami Reuben at Art's Delicatessan. The motto at Art's Deli in Studio City is "Every sandwich is a work of art." The deli, which has changed little sinc ... More >>

Punk Singer 'Casey Chaos' Drunkenly Terrorized Studio City in His SUV Last Night, Says LAPD

TMZ reported this morning that 46-year-old punk singer Karim Chmielinski -- better known as Casey Chaos, frontman and founder of the hardcore L.A. group Amen -- "allegedly smashed his SUV into as many as 15 parked cars" on a "drunken demolition derby" to his Studio City home last night. LAPD Sergea ... More >>

Studio City 9th-Grader Gets Science Project Stuck in Palm Tree -- One Week Before State Fair

Christian Stewart, a freshman at Harvard-Westlake Upper School in Studio City, came up with the best science project ever this year. It's called "Low-Cost Autonomous Civilian Unmanned Aerial Systems," and it's essentially an affordable drone that your average dude would be able use for daily spying ... More >>

The Popsicle Queen: Kaileigh Brielle, Suck It Popsicle Adventures

Kaileigh Brielle went to film school, dabbled in filmmaking and then, realizing that she needed a more concrete profession, became a licensed optician, working for someone else before opening her own optical shop in Toluca Lake. That should have been enough creative productivity for a lifetime, but ... More >>

Adopt a Bubbe for a Day, Gardening How to Plant a Food Forest

If arts and crafts with Bubbe isn't your thing, maybe you'd like to help plant a Food Forest in Studio City. Or you can dig in the dirt with the Florence Firestone Community Gardeners. Or if you want to get in on some kitchen action while making new friends, then go to Ronald McDonald House and he ... More >>

Studio City Woman Says Neighbor's Energy-Efficient Windows Are Melting Her Prius

CBS LAThe dark side of green living.​Thank you, CBS LA, for getting to the bottom of this one. Never has the brave new world of eco-friendly consumerism reached a conundrum so ridiculous: Heather Patron, a resident of notoriously crunchy Studio City, tells the station that her Prius is melt ... More >>

Deep Fried Fluffernutter at Black Market: Sandwich of the Week

Deep-frying improbable edibles is hardly new. County fair concessions maven Chicken Charlie has fried up Oreos, Twinkies, frog legs, White Castle burgers, SPAM, zucchini, Pop Tarts, brownies, ribs and Kool-Aid balls -- and that's only the beginning The combo of crisp batter and gooey center speaks ... More >>

New Jazz Bakery In Jeopardy; West Side Jazz Scene Hurting

Tom MeekThe Ron Jones Orchestra at the Jazz Bakery, 2008​The Jazz Bakery, L.A.'s major jazz non-profit organization, is in turmoil because of the pending shutdown of the Culver City Redevelopment Agency. Jazz Bakery president Ruth Price had been working with the agency to reopen Jazz Bakery's ... More >>

Stout Brings Burgers to Studio City, Santa Monica

Courtesy of SpacecraftA rendering of Stout in Studio City.​Another day, another Spacecraft CG rendering. This time it's the new locations of upscale burger and beer bar Stout, which is set to open outposts in Studio City and Santa Monica. (Despite the nightmarish parking in the Cahuenga Corrid ... More >>

5 Best Gelato Shops in Los Angeles

Guzzle & NoshAssorted flavors at Gelato Bar in Los Feliz.​Yesterday, we listed the 5 Best Ice Cream Shops in Los Angeles. Today, we move onto gelato. Taxonomy is crucial in these matters. 5. Gelato Bar (Los Feliz, Studio City): Owned by Gail Silverton (sister of Mozza pizza queen Nancy), Gela ... More >>

Brian Posehn's Perfect Day In The Valley: Food, Toys More Food

Brian Posehn is a comic, writer, actor, and food-eater. The Comedians of Comedy, Sarah Silverman Program, and Mr. Show alumnus is also a dedicated San Fernando Valleyite and gastronome. Squid Ink recently asked Posehn to describe what his most perfectest day in the Valley with his wife and baby wo ... More >>

LA's Top 10 Ice Cream & Gelato Spots

Guzzle & Nosh​[Catch up on the full 30 Scoops in 30 Days trek in our sweet, creamy archive.] Americans remember President Ronald Reagan as any number of things: The Great Communicator, a proponent of trickle-down economics, a hack former actor with a penchant for chimpanzees. Few, however, kn ... More >>

RIP: Influential Guitar Maker Travis Bean Is Dead

Guitarmaker Travis Bean died earlier this week at his home in Burbank. His guitars were played by everyone from Jerry Garcia to Steve Albini to Slash, and were known for their sustain and durability. You just can't break one of them. Born in San Fernando, his eponymous Valley-based company was fo ... More >>

Despite L.A. City Ban, New Pot Dispensaries Reportedly Open in Studio City, North Hollywood

Green = green.​Officially -- and that's the key word here -- only about 100 pot shops in L.A. are supposed to eventually survive. That's what would remain from about 550 or so that existed in the city last year. The dispensaries, eligible to stay only if they were opened before a failed, 2007 ... More >>

30 Scoops in 30 Days: Gelato Bar (Day 11)

It's both cruel and practical that Gelato Bar limits customers to three samples. Otherwise, we'd probably be lolling at the counter and annoying the clerks as we taste our way through the shop's repertoire of dense, Italian-themed gelato flavors. Owned by Gail Silverton (sister of Mozza's pizza qu ... More >>

Funny, You Don't Look Famous

Jonathan Gold Reviews Mo-Chica

Ask Mr. Gold: What's The Big Deal With Quinoa?

Anne Fishbeinthe invisible restaurant critic​ Dear Mr. Gold: What's the big deal with quinoa? I couldn't even pronounce it right when I first saw it on the menu at Hugo's in Studio City. Then I saw it at Trader Joe's and then I saw it everywhere. It has probably been around forever, but has on ... More >>

Jonathan Gold Reviews Robata Jinya

Eatery expands from Studio City to Third Street's growing restaurant row

Umami Burger #5 Now Open in Studio City: Burgers, Walk-up Bar A Stuffed Swan

A. ScattergoodUmami Burger, Studio City​ Umami Burger opened its 5th location in two years last Wednesday, making a very good case for future global hegemony. Well, okay, maybe city-wide hegemony. Whatever. The sleek new spot went in right next door to Mexicali Cocina Cantina in the space tha ... More >>

Measure L: Studio City Librarian Karen Pickard-Four Says Teens and Seniors Feel the Pain of Budget Cuts at L.A. Libraries

Ted SoquiRichard J. Riordan Central Library in downtown L.A.​At the Studio City Branch Library in the San Fernando Valley, acting senior librarian Karen Pickard-Four says teens and senior citizens feel the pain of severe budget cuts at the Los Angeles Public Library system. "For those kids w ... More >>

69 Things for Music Lovers to Do In L.A. on Valentine's Day

Timothy Norris​ Don't sacrifice your Monday night music excursions into our fair city of Los Angeles, just to be a slave to the grueling whip of commercialized love. You can have your cake and eat it too, especially if that cake comes with a plethora of "ingredients" that help you get your ro ... More >>

Barista Champ Nik Krankl Coming to Gelato Bar in Studio City

Barista extraoridinaire Nik Krankl, who just won the Intelligentsia barista championship for wholesalers in Chicago, will be showing off his steaming, swirling and pulling talents as guest barista at Gelato Bar in Gelato Bar's Studio City (4342 1/2 Tujunga Ave. Studio City, CA 91604). Pop in if you ... More >>

Barbara Fairchild Joins Twitter

​Barbara Fairchild, former editor of Bon Appétit, author of the just-published cookbook Bon Appétit Desserts, Studio City resident and generally lovely person, is now on Twitter. Because she has a bit more time these days (when we spoke to her by phone a few minutes ago, she was at home, h ... More >>

September Roundup of Restaurant Openings and Closures

October is creeping up on us, with or without this unexpected heat wave. Angelenos patiently waited in the 90-degree heat at the Abbot Kinney Street Festival on Sunday, September 26th, salivating over grilled cheese sandwiches, fried shrimp, bánh mì, funnel cakes and kitschy L.A. food trucks. If y ... More >>

Chi Dynasty Opens Second Location in Studio City

Chi Dynasty Studio City​Chi Dynasty in Los Feliz has been serving up Chinese food for more than 25 years. Owner Jonathan Chi must have wanted to make sure he had his formula for success just right - because it took him a quarter century in the biz, to take the leap and open a second spot, thi ... More >>

LA Chocolate Salon: Chocolate Mustaches, A New Fudge Operation, A Cupcake Shop Coming to Sherman Oaks, and Chocolate Bars with GPS Coordinates

A. Scattergoodchocolates from Neapolitan Printing & Co.​This past weekend's Luxury Chocolate Salon, in which 35 chocolatiers and confectioners and bakers--and a lot of chocaholics--gathered at the Pasadena Convention Center, was more fun than you'd think you'd have under glaring fluorescent li ... More >>

Abstract Truths

More Flooding in September: Ed Hardy Gets Wet

A day after a Los Angeles Department of Water and Power spokeswoman told the Weekly that all the subterranean water-system carnage that's happened over the week is "normal," another pipe burst, closing Melrose Boulevard near Fairfax Avenue and sending water rushing into a nearby -- gasp! -- Ed Hardy ... More >>

Another Pipe Bursts: Street Flooding 'Normal' in September, Says DWP

The oft-arid nature of this city belies a subterranean water world that sometimes flows like an El Nino storm in reverse. This, of course, is what happened Saturday when a 95-year-old water main ruptured on Cold Water Canyon Avenue near Ventura Boulevard in Studio City, sending cars adrift, flooding ... More >>

New loopholes for Los Angeles billboards and "sign districts"

A heated hearing unfolded earlier today before the Los Angeles City Planning Commission, which wants to create yet another complicated, exception-filled plan to try to control street clutter in Los Angeles, the capital of the illegal billboard industry.Details of today's hearing will come from ace r ... More >>

Today in Photographs: February 16, 1943

Cahuenga Pass, before the freeway. Note landscaping and railroad tracks. The picture brings to mind Raymond Chandler's famous road revelry in The Little Sister, that begins with Philip Marlowe recalling: "I drove east on Sunset but I didn't go home. At La Brea I turned north and swung over to Highla ... More >>

The Mermaid & Sportsmen's Lodge Remembered

Two more vintage nightlife venues that helped define Southern California's quirkiness have closed or face possible extinction. L.A. Daily asked some longtime locals for their thoughts about Hermosa Beach's Mermaid bar and restaurant (whose lot is for sale), and Studio City's shuttered Sportsmen's Lo ... More >>

Dare to Enter!

Another for the Bushel

Raw Power

Los Angeles sushi chefs reinvent the modern kitchen

Ask Mr. Gold

Snake Bites

Letters

Ask Mr. Gold

The Valley

From Canoga Park to Griffith Park

Soft-Shoe Sushi

Tap with your tuna in Studio City