no. 3

Grill On The Alley

Saturday night dinner.
The Grill On The Alley in Beverly Hills.

This place is a pretty classic old school styled steakhouse in Beverly Hills.  
Apparently it is the "home of the entertainment industry's "power lunch"

We started with a round of martini's and one of the evening's specials, the tuna tartare.
Martini was good, tuna was a fine - but needed something.  It came with 3 sauces, but it was still lacking.

For dinner we had:
Baked Parmesan Crusted Chilean Sea Bass
and
Prime New York Pepper Steak
with
Wine referred by our waiter.


Both entrees were fine, but surprisingly mediocre. Good, but nothing amazing.
The dinner was enjoyable because of our waiter/table runner Dan though.  He was a delight!  :)
Very accommodating and friendly.

Since our meals were a little blah, we talked ourselves into dessert and shared a slice of key lime pie.
AMAZING!
Silky smooth and creamy, sweet but tart.


Finished the meal on a high note!
 

no.4

Ford's Filling Station

Located in downtown Culver City, this restaurant is pretty fun.
The menu overall has standard dishes that have been a little funk-i-fied.

We each had 'Eric's Manhattan' which had both sweet and dry vermouth, and was very very good.
So far this lunch was starting off right!!


For an appetizer we shared the
Shrimp Pil Pil {made with garlic, marash pepper and sherry}
Pretty good.  A little spicy, and very garlicky.  Served with bread that helped calm down the burn from the marash pepper that was generously sprinkled on the shrimp.

Main dish we had:
Shrimp Curry { with jasmine rice, marash pepper and topped with applewood bacon }
and the
Pub Burger {+ cheddar cheese and bacon }

Shrimp curry
A- rating.
It had strips of bacon! Whaa! Unexpected, but a nice surprise.
Shrimp, rice, spices and sauce were all great. Perfect for lunch.

Pub Burger
The burger was gigantic, and served with bacon and cheddar cheese that really made it standout.


Phew!

no.2 part 2 {Kitchen 24}

Ventured over to Kitchen24 again for a little lunch.
I hadn't had much for breakfast, so eggs and a good book sounded pretty good for lunch.

I ordered a Ginger Ale
and
the Garden Benedict:

toasted english muffin, with ham, avocado and poached eggs topped with smoked paprika hollandaise, served with herb roasted potatoes.

The first few bites of the garden benedict started off well enough, nicely poached eggs, ripe avocado -  but after awhile that smoked paprika sauce became so overwhelming! I couldn't taste anything else!

I suddenly noticed as I was making a mess with my eggs and benedicts the rest of my food and the smokey paprika sauce were locked in a land battle and I was kept busy trying to keep the sauce off my potatoes before they also tasted like nothing but smokey paprika.

Unfortunately, the potatoes didn't make it.

My advice - order the smokey paprika hollandaise on the side!!

no. 3

Delancey

Delancey, Delancey, Delancey.....

I have some nice memories at Delancey.  Just a few blocks from work, I've had dinner and drinks after work, before a movie or show. Delancey always doing its part in making for an overall enjoyable evening.
The dark, small, seemingly unpretentious, New York styled little pizzeria tucked into a corner off of Sunset definitely has a draw to it. They have a pretty awesome beer selection, their food is almost always delicious and reasonably priced, and you don't really feel like you're a step off of Sunset Blvd.

We decided to have dinner at Delancey because it is a source of comfort, it's familiar and cozy.
After a long week we wanted to have a hassle free, enjoyable dinner.

We started with:
Antipasti - {Thinly Sliced Bresoala with Arugula, topped with Grana Padano cheese and Lemon dressing}
Very, very good. Light, but very flavorful. (turns out bresoala is a type of air-dried salted beef - which, I did not know!)

For dinner:
Goat Cheese Ravioli w/ Peas and Prosciutto
and
Penne alla Vodka with Italian Sausage

Both pasta dishes are 'two thumbs up!'

The Goat Cheese Ravioli was extremely rich, but oh so good.  It's so rich after a few little ravioli's it's almost too much. Goat cheese, prosciutto and cream sauce! Oh my!
I would recommend maybe splitting it with someone and then getting another side or antipasti to share. 

Penne all Vodka - oh you spicy, delicious devil!
So satisfying. Spicy, but smooth.  This has been a favorite for awhile.  So much so, it's hard to turn it down even when you want to try something new.

But I was surprised by the bad over all customer service.
Kind of a bummer to the whole evening, but what can you do?

Sorry Delancey, but we're on to the next!! 

no. 2

Kitchen 24


Ah, brunch.  I love brunch.
Brunch means it's the weekend, and I'm not at work. Hooray!

This weekend we decided to have brunch and picked out Kitchen 24 in Hollywood as our next dineLA restaurant destination.  I've actually been here a couple times before for lunch, but never brunch or dinner.

 
Kitchen 24 is a modern styled diner with a new take on classic diner food and is actually open 24/7
(I hear it's a hot spot after the bars close)

We started with a proper brunch item, a Bloody Mary {! a favorite of mine !} and a Jalepeno Margarita.
The bloody mary was deliciously spicy and very tall, it made the margarita look tiny in comparison! The margarita was deliciously spicy as well, but also refreshing with crushed cilantro.

Our brunch consisted of:

The Home Skillet  {skillet cooked hash browns w/ 2 poached eggs and sausage and toast}
Really good!  Hash browns can be tricky, sometimes they're too crisp on the outside and almost raw on the inside or just one big crisp - either way, not good. 
K24's were excellent!  Great dish!

and the

Bartender’s Banquet {basically half a breakfast burrito and a waffle with strawberries}
Awesome dish.  As delicious as waffles are, sometimes they aren't quite enough. So this plate is pretty great because you get the yummy waffle, but with something a little more substantial.

Highly recommended! 

We finished our meal with a vanilla/chocolate swirl milk shake and a walk through the Hollywood Farmer's Market.

Cheers to brunch!

no. 1

Rh At The Andaz




After much and deliberation and research we decided on having our first meal from the gift cards at RH at The Andaz Hotel in West Hollywood. A French restaurant inspired by the fresh, local produce.
We were looking for a restaurant that had an interesting menu yet comforting food, not too heavy but something substantial {and also had oysters}.

RH fit the bill!

'Inspired by the sun-drenched landscape of Southwest France, and the freshest produce from Southern California's markets"

First course:
Gin Martini w/ an olive
Fanny Bay Oysters {British Colombia - served with roasted pork sausage}
Hudson Valley Foie Gras {served with plum marmalade, arugula and homemade brioche}

The oysters came first and were amazing. Sweet and briny, beautiful and perfectly sized. The oysters  were from British Colombia and are now a new favorite of mine. The dish was served with a side of pork sausage which was also really really great.  Nice compliment of flavors between the sausage and oysters.
The only downside is that they didn't cut the meat free from the shell before serving, which makes it a little difficult to do yourself with the little oyster fork. Other than that - divine!

The foie gras was served as two thick medallions, with a plump serving of marmalade on the side.
Extremely rich and smooth, also another standout of the meal. Although, the marmalade was quite strong and it over-powered the foie gras a bit.

So far, we are off to a very decadent start!

Entree:
Pinot Noir
Duck Confit {served with sauteed potatoes}
Diver Scallops {served with sweet corn gnocchi}

The duck confit was ahead of the game.  Really great - crispy skin, moist, flavorful meat.
Highly recommended! Potatoes were a perfect compliment making a delicious provencal style meal.

The scallops were okay. Not a bad choice, but it did not compare to the duck confit.
The scallops seemed a little fishy at first, but paired with the gnocchi it was quite nice.
Another great dish - but the duck... the duck!

Unfortunately there was no room for dessert after the rich, comforting, delicious dinner - next meal for sure though!

a happening of luck...

Holey MOLEY.
I just won the "dineLA For A Year" contest!!

The Basics:

52 restaurants
52 weeks
1 big appetite


If you're not familiar with dineLA, it's a program that puts together events and information for the Los Angeles restaurant community. Most notably the dineLA Restaurant Week, which is a twice a year event where various restaurants throughout LA create specially priced three-course meals for Angelenos to explore and try.  Always a fun and interesting event!
The most recent restaurant week dineLA put together they also had a give-away for a few of the restaurants that participate in the event.
A gift card at 52 of the restaurants, one for each week.  dineLA for a year!!
And I won!!!!!