Who would have guessed that a small innocuous little cafe in a random part of downtown
would offer not only decent food, but fairly authentic French cafe food?

No one was as surprised as I was, let me tell you. After all, restaurants that boast French food (including places actually staffed and run by French people) rarely if ever actually deliver on the claim.

But I’m happy to report that Angelique Cafe makes good! [ Read The Full Story -> ]

Soot Bull Jeep – Natural Charcoal B.B.Q. HouseKorean B.B.Q.

I’ve been a vegetarian for more years than I can remember and coming from the “if I have to cook it myself, why am I paying for the privilege,” school of thought, you might say that my virginal entrance into the Zagat rated Soot Bull Jeep’s Natural Charcoal B.B.Q. House doors would spell disaster.

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I’m always on the lookout for restaurants that are easy to go to - the kind of place you can take a group of people and everyone finds something they really like. Hugo’s in Studio City fits that description perfectly.

Hugo’s is a diner in the sense of having tons of varied options and serving breakfast all day. They take it to a California level, however, by using fresh, organic ingredients and offering tons of really healthy, delicious choices. Other patrons recommended everything from the burger and fries to mung bean and quinoa, two things so healthy I only vaguely know what they are.

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Although L.A. sometimes feels like the universe’s center of fickle taste and rapidly changing appearances, it’s still possible to find little nooks and crannies that are untouched by time. One place is breakfast/lunch spot Snug Harbor in Santa Monica. Opened in 1941 as an all-American burger diner, Snug Harbor’s interior is nearly all original – green leather booths line the perimeter, with matching barstools affixed around a stainless steel and linoleum counter. Its worn, relaxed patina is very soothing, and it will convince you (if only temporarily) that it’s ok to slow down - you’ll have time for everything.

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There’s something to be said about fresh seafood. It just tastes better. Plus, you know it’s not some funky defrosted, fished-who-knows-when mystery seafood.

So when I first read about San Nag-Jik, my curiosity was piqued, to say the least. I’m not sure what the tradition of it is, but I have a feeling it goes way, way back. There’s very primitive about it, but in a good way. After all, this is how we ate for millenia.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, San Nag-Jik is live octopus.

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As varied as the restaurants in Los Angeles are, Benihana remains an anomaly. Few, if any, other establishments prepare food at the table while the customers look on. The uninitiated are always surprised to discover, upon a first visit, that the diner is a willing participant in the culinary spectacle for which the restaurant is best known. In other words, first-timers are always surprised when the chef slicing up their shrimp intentionally lobs the tails in their laps rather than at their plates. If a server in a traditional restaurant threw food at a customer, it would be safe to say the dinner would be comped and the server would be out of a job. Thankfully, Benihana is anything but a traditional restaurant.

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If you’d like a very affordable taste of heaven you should pay a visit to Amandine, a French bakery and café wedged between a party shop and a carpet store in West L.A. Its ivy-covered façade and quaint umbrella sidewalk tables put it in a world apart from the wide river of dingy traffic rushing past on Wilshire Blvd.

Inside, you’ll find worn hardwood and tile floors and glass cases filled with heaping baskets of golden pastries. A massive stone oven dominates a corner of the shop, and bakers are regularly sliding puffy artisan loaves in and out of the flames [ Read The Full Story -> ]

Hot damn I love a juicy hot dog.

Get the best fresh bun, fresh ‘mater, green relish, hot pepper hot dog made to hot, piping perfection at the last place in LA you’d expect to find it. In other words, NOT at the end of a big line curling ’round the corner. NOT where you go after you get off the plane and want a hot dog. NOT, that is, at a landmark. For the love of god, the best hot dog in LA is NOT at Pink’s, people! It is, like most of the best places in the Valley, tucked away in a nondescript mini mall, on a nondescript side of a nondescript boulevard, lined with mind numbing signs of nothing. Attached to a liquor store.

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Hidely ho, readerinos.

I’m sad to report that there will be no Weird Food Wednesday this week.

Well, I’m sad for you… Personally, I’m thrilled.

But rest assured, we’re hard at work tracking down the most bizarre, unusual and just plain weird things to chow on for next week…

Some upcoming highlights: snake, alligator, cobra, armadillo… Oh, and san nag-jik. You know, live octopus. Cuz that’s how we roll here at the WFW.

By Jenae Cohn

Los Angeles hipsters don’t eat French fries, right? Basic Americana cuisine, typically reserved for fast food joints and diners, seems out of place on West Sunset Boulevard, a strip defined by street-corner Italian cafés with sparkling water and homemade gnocchi and French restaurants with finger-sized portions of escargot and fine foie gras. Yet Ketchup, a member of LA’s notorious Dolce Group restaurant chain, proves that a bowl of mac n’ cheese and a sloppy joes can be as cool and classy as the young patrons themselves.

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Forget Denny’s and IHOP. Forget Toi. I’ve found your new late night, after-partying destination. The Waffle is located on Sunset, right next to The Palladium, across the street from the Cinerama Dome. You know, next to that crazy Coffee Bean.

When you wander through the front door of The Waffle, your eyes are greeted by orange and brown. And some yellow. And maybe some Burnt Sienna. A color combination designed to inspire hunger. My impression is that if you took a Waffle House out of West Texas and gentrified it, you would end up with The Waffle. Which isn’t a bad thing. It’s actually quite awesome if it’s 2 a.m. and you’re ready to get your grub on.

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Cafe 630 is a tasty little soup, salad, and sandwich shop located in the Central Library building. You’ll also find Panda Express and TCBY, but I’m not a junk food fan. Have I mentioned I have the metabolism of a large dead man?

Café 630 is a great place to grab a tuna sandwich and fruit salad (my favorite). Sometimes they have Lentil soup, which is great for us vegetarians. Their daily soup and half sandwich special will run you $5.99 and is plenty of food.

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