Hello LA

Where I'm eating. Where I used to eat. A little horror. And the best candy in the world.

Landed in LA on Tuesday night and went, immediately, to Pizzeria Mozza. Bit into one of these tiny tomato-drenched arancini and thought, “I’m back.”

Then I had one of these tiny (about 2 inches long) Japanese sweet potatoes topped with sour cream, scallions and crisped prosciutto and instantly ate another. Yes, that good.

And then, a perfect pizza napoletana, topped with anchovies and olives. As I sipped my wine, I began thinking about all the other places I want to eat.

So yesterday I went to Yuca’s on Hillhurst for my beloved bean and cheese burrito. (Sorry, I was so eager that I completely forgot to take a picture.) Dinner at Connie and Ted’s. It’s one of my favorite local restaurants: I went for the fried belly clams, and whole sea urchin, my usual order. But when I realized it was Wednesday, the one night they make bouillabaisse, I could not resist. This is, I think the best I’ve had in America; filled with fish, fennel and flavor, it tastes as if a thousand fish went swimming through that incredibly complex broth.

Last night I went to Here’s Looking at You, one of the most welcoming restaurants in the city. Closed during the pandemic, the small K-town restaurant is so beloved that the community rallied to save it. The brilliance of the cooking lies in the way the chef combines unexpected flavors. Consider, for example, the notion of pairing bay scallops with passion fruit. Sounds strange, but when you take a bite, you know these two foods have always longed to be together. The perfect contrast in both flavor and texture.

Because the chefs think about both the way foods will taste and feel in your mouth, their coarsely chopped steak tartare is justifiably famous

Uni custard topped with crisped wild rice and salmon roe: how could it be anything but wonderful?

But my favorite dish of the evening was this hamachi with wakame, white soy, daikon and chiles. Hamachi has never been so well served.

Tonight? I’m off to Spago with friends. For forty years this has been one of my favorite restaurants in the entire country, and I wouldn’t dream of leaving this city without indulging in dinner there.

But I’m eager to try all the new places: Mother Wolf, Lulu, The Girl and the Goat, Kateen, Caldo Verde, Socolo… And there are so many old favorites I’m longing to revisit. Chengdu Taste. Holbox, Jar. Park’s. Antico. Angler. Lukshon. Tsubaki. Night + Market. Jitlada. a.o.c. Stay tuned…..

Looking through old articles I’d written about Los Angeles I came upon this one. The national conversation about gun control is still raging, and this seemed apt at this moment.

When I wrote this I was still living up north in Berkeley; I’d come to LA to review a restaurant. My dining companion, the man who threw the keys away, was the magazine’s wine critic. I wish I could remember which restaurant we were heading off to before we were so rudely interrupted.

The first big-deal restaurant I ever visited in Los Angeles was Scandia. Sadly, the fat pr folder I found for the restaurant contained only this photograph of the inside. What I remember best is the majestic building, an elegant mid-century modern building that surveyed Sunset Boulevard with attitude. You knew, every time you drove by, that the restaurant esteemed itself.

Everybody went there, including five American presidents. Frank Sinatra had an office upstairs. It was where tourists went to see stars (if they could snag a table). The wine list was legendary. And rare for its time: it was strong in older American vintages.

I mention Scandia because it is proof of the great changes that have taken place in American restaurants. Owner Ken Hansen came to America as a busboy on a ship and worked his way up until he was able to open a restaurant to showcase his native cuisine. At lunch there were the traditional open-faced sandwiches. Appetizers included Swedish meatballs and pumpernickel toast. Main-course specialties included pork and veal dumplings, bof med log (tenderloin with fried onions). I remember roast duck with wild game sauce, Swedish browned potatoes, cucumber salad and lingonberries with particular pleasure. Never tried Scandia’s most famous dish, The Viking Sword, and I can’t imagine anyone ordering it today. It offered a smoked pork chop, an entire Chateaubriand, and turkey breast in a mountain of Béarnaise sauce.

As you can see from the near-desperation of the press release, times were already changing in the mid-eighties. People were eating goat cheese and counting calories. Food was getting lighter and new waves of immigrants were introducing an entire palette of new flavors to the city.

Today it’s hard to find Scandinavian restaurants in Los Angeles (or in much of America for that matter). And that beautiful Scandia building? The restaurant closed in 1987, was empty for many years, and torn down in 2015.

The Hollywood Edition Hotel now stands on the site of the old Scandia. Its flagship restaurant is called Ardor. The cuisine, from New York chef John Fraser is described as “a showcase for vegetable-forward healthy California cuisine with flavors inspired by local ingredients.”

If you live in Los Angeles you’re addicted to Littlejohn’s English Toffee.

This is, of course, an exaggeration, but not much. People here have loved this sublime candy for almost a hundred years. And with good reason. I never leave here without a few boxes for people back home. And if I’m away for a while I simply order it on line.

There’s some fascinating American candy history involved with this toffee; I wrote about it here.