Wrapped around a glowing swimming pool that turns every vantage into a David Hockney painting, Blue Velvet is a hyperdesigned lounge fitted into the ground floor of a former Holiday Inn, with the cool blues of Staples Center and the financial-district skyscrapers just beyond. Some of the herbs... More >>
Ciudad, the pan-Latin outpost of Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger, may be all things to all people but especially to all people whose pleasures include digging into a ceviche plate and bending an elbow every now and then: There are strong mojitos, mellow Pisco sours and an inspiring... More >>
Yes, we know about the old standards and the new, the austere Tokyo-based chain with branches in local Japanese supermarkets, and the impeccably credentialed noodle czars. We've heard all the arguments about authenticity, and we've seen Tampopo too many times to count. But ramen, a noodle soup... More >>
Until a local website praised its carne asada, El Parian was best known for its birria, Guadalajara-style roasted goat in broth, and when you sat down at one of the well-battered tables, the waitress didn't offer you a menu, she asked whether you were having a full order or were only hungry... More >>
Shabu shabu has become a local fad in the last few years a transparent petal of prime beef swished through bubbling broth for a second or two, just until the pink becomes frosted with white. You can find shabu shabu restaurants now in half the suburbs in the county. But when the dish is... More >>
Even given the gentrification of downtown, the Nickel appears less like a diner than a movie set, a seemingly unreconstructed '40s-era greasy spoon that popped up a few steps from what used to be considered the gamiest intersection in town, on a block where artists in natty hats share the... More >>
Sustainable? No. Organic? Probably not. Multicultural? Only when strictly necessary. Patina's exquisitely wrought dining room in Disney Hall is the most important restaurant space in California, and Joachim Splichal is a master of modern global cuisine, finely crafted, vegetable-intensive... More >>
Now that its only serious competitor is about to be retrofitted into a gleaming replica of itself, Philippe's is one of the few remaining artifacts of the Los Angeles that Philip Marlowe knew, a sprawling complex of long tables, cheap coffee, sawdust-sprinkled floors and a Depression-era beef... More >>
It would be hard to overestimate the influence of John Rivera, who introduced the idea of new Southwestern Cuisine 25 years ago at the late St. Estephe, marrying classical French technique to the flavors imprinted onto his palate as a kid in New Mexico – at this remove, it’s hard even to... More >>
If Godzilla decided to explore her feminine side, she might be tempted to wear Tiara's giant, glittery range hood on her head, just the sort of Audrey Hepburn–esque touch Mothra might find attractive. Tiara, Fred Eric's Dr. Seuss–flavored Fashion District restaurant, shoots the girly... More >>
A big-city fish restaurant, Water Grill is a redoubt of oysters and fresh scallops, sparkling fish and sea creatures we can’t even pronounce, in one of the busiest commercial corridors of downtown. It was widely assumed that the restaurant would wither into irrelevancy when former chef... More >>
It may be a little strange to start a review by praising a restaurant's tap water, but Wood Spoon's really is the best in town: triple-filtered, no doubt, served sharply cool, and flavored with whole cinnamon sticks, which give the water a delicate fragrance and tint it the color of dilute... More >>
Just beyond the range of the alternate jurors who lunch, Wurstkuche occupies the kind of way-downtown location everybody loves, a short walk from SCI-Arc but leagues away from Bunker Hill bankers; a few steps from the center of the Arts District but hidden from casual passersby, especially if... More >>