Besha Rodell

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Best Restaurant

Besha Rodell
Sometimes I take notes on my phone while dining out, in order to remember later how something tasted or how it made me feel. From my last meal at n/naka, I have only one entry. It reads, "Sushi course: This is what fairies eat. On their birthday." In addition to......
Credit: Anne Fishbein

Best New Alta California Restaurant

Besha Rodell
Mexican chef Diego Hernández is best known for his restaurant Corazón de Tierra in Baja's Valle de Guadalupe, which has racked up admirers and accolades, including a ranking of No. 39 on The World's 50 Best Restaurants of Latin America. Hernández recently made his much-anticipated L.A. restaurant debut with Verlaine,......
Credit: Anne Fishbein

Best $20 Ramen

Besha Rodell
At MTN, Travis Lett's new Abbot Kinney izakaya, the ramen is almost a thing unto itself, so much a product of its time and place that it's hard to compare it to other ramen. Lett and his crew have managed to make something based in Japanese tradition but rooted in......
Credit: Anne Fishbein

Best Use of Fresh Veggies

Besha Rodell
Josef Centeno is doing something slightly different at P.Y.T., something that makes this newest venture relevant in its own right. Where all the food at his Bäco Mercat — meat and meat-free — is aiming for maximum flavor and contrast and excitement, the food at P.Y.T. is more focused on......
Credit: Anne Fishbein

Best Up-and-Coming Chef

Besha Rodell
The recent reinvention of Michael's, the 38-year-old Santa Monica mainstay that helped to define modern Californian cooking, rests mainly on the brilliant decision to hire Miles Thompson, the young chef who used to run Allumette in Echo Park and then left town for a couple of years. Thompson's cooking was......
Credit: Anne Fishbein

Best Mexican Seafood

Besha Rodell
There's been some debate and consternation over the fate of Coni'Seafood since chef Sergio Peñuelas left, but we're here to tell you there's nothing to fear. Left in the hands of owners Vicente Cossio and his daughter Connie Cossio, the restaurant is still turning out some of the best Mexican......
Trofie

Best New Restaurant

Besha Rodell
Felix, the Venice restaurant from pasta maestro Evan Funke, has it all. The space is wonderful in the way that only restaurants built in old houses can be, outfitted in warm brown leather booths and green botanical wallpaper that feels both modern and vintage. The service is lovely. The cocktails......
Credit: Frank Lee

Best Fast-Casual Restaurant

Besha Rodell
BäcoShop is restaurateur Josef Centeno's first foray beyond downtown, where his five other restaurants dominate the couple of blocks where Main and Fourth streets meet. It's based on the food item that defines Bäco Mercat, his original downtown restaurant, the bäco — a Centeno-invented folded flatbread that is part sandwich,......
N/naka chef Niki Nakayama; Credit: Courtesy n/naka

Best Restaurant

Besha Rodell
Sometimes I take notes on my phone while dining out, in order to remember later how something tasted or how it made me feel. From my last meal at n/naka, I have only one entry. It reads, "Sushi course: This is what fairies eat. On their birthday." In addition to......