Posts by Richard Foss
Crush Bistro: Liberating dining hard to resist [RESTAURANT REVIEW]
Some restaurant meals invite introspection, even demand it; when a chef has sculpted some ornately garnished tower of unlikely ingredients, and served it forth, you don’t just toss it back and see what’s next. It would be like sprinting through the Louvre, glancing briefly at the Mona Lisa as you sped by. This, in a…
Read MoreSalt Creek Grille [RESTAURANT REVIEW]
The very best parties I have been to were the ones with a variety of moods, where a quiet conversation in a roomful of books is only a few steps away from a place of loud and wild revelry. Some people will spend all evening in intellectual pursuits, some in noisy hedonism, and a few…
Read MoreIs there a distinct, emerging South Bay palate? Local celebrity chefs weigh in
Taste buds are as individual as fingerprints. This might seem to indicate that predicting what people will order at restaurants is doomed to fail. Nevertheless, there is such thing as regional flavor, and I thought it might be interesting to ask local chefs if there is a South Bay taste. I was particularly interested in…
Read MoreRok Sushi, an exciting restaurant with a lounge vibe
One of the challenges of our legal system is finding an impartial jury in a celebrity case, the kind that is splashed all over the media in real time. It used to be that jurors could deliberately avoid learning details by not reading newspapers, but the ubiquity of television and the net means that we…
Read MoreFishBar [RESTAURANT REVIEW]
Anyone who has tried living in a house that is in the midst of a major remodeling knows that it’s no fun at all. You put up with having to go around sawhorses to get to the bathroom, the sawdust and plastic sheeting everywhere. But it’s disruptive; it doesn’t feel like your old home, and…
Read MoreMysterious Galaxy, new bookstore to create communities of readers
Those who appreciate science fiction, fantasy, and mysteries have been watching the construction on Artesia near the Galleria with a hungry eye – when would Mysterious Galaxy, the South Bay’s newest bookstore, be open? The day has finally come, and we got a preview of the operation while workers were still painting the parking lot…
Read MoreMediterranean Bounty
Faya Gerges with her Zayna’s Flaming Salad and lamb kabob plate. Photo by Alexandra Mandekic Mediterranean cuisine is a broad term. Zayna’s Flaming Grill brings it into focus I used to carp at restaurants that claim to serve Mediterranean cuisine because cooks in the various Mediterranean cultures have invented so many ways of using the…
Read MoreVeggie Grill co-founder T.K. Pillan: The Accidental Vegetarian
“Our motto is ‘Taste and Believe.’ We believe if people try it, they will have their minds changed” It was by no means inevitable that the restaurant that Manhattan Beach resident T.K. Pillan co-founded would serve vegetarian food. At the time he started the project, he wasn’t a vegetarian. “My parents were vegetarian, but I…
Read MoreA La Carte: The Strand House, HT Grill, Chez Melange, The Counter
Highs and Lows… Last week I had the best and worst meals of the year so far, a pair of experiences that show everything that can go right and wrong with a restaurant. I won’t divulge the name of the place that got virtually everything wrong; the place had very recently changed concept and management,…
Read MoreMB Post is post-cultural with American, Asian, Middle Eastern influences [RESTAURANT REVIEW]
Modern cooking is fractal -– as you delve into the nature of a dish, you discover complexities of flavors, ingredients, and preparations. This can make writing a menu devilishly hard. How do you describe intricate dishes to both inform and entice diners? Too terse, and you don’t express the balance of flavors – too wordy,…
Read MoreNew Orleans Cuisine cajun restaurant stays tight with tradition
Alligator on a stick? This is the place. I have a feeling about New Orleans that approximates the way medieval pilgrims must have felt about Canterbury; everything about the place refreshes me spiritually, makes me feel in the presence of greatness. Forget New York, set aside even my beloved Los Angeles – the center of…
Read MoreThe Crush Bistro and Wine Bar opens in El Segundo
The Crush Bistro in El Segundo doesn’t have their wine license yet and isn’t serving anything that has actually been crushed, but they are worth a look if you’re in the area at lunchtime. They offer very good Vietnamese-style sandwiches and salads at very modest prices, and if they keep this quality and value coming…
Read MoreRockefeller gastropub takes Yelp controversy public
The Rockefeller versus Yelp, Round One Many restaurateurs fume quietly about vindictive or ignorant reviews on Yelp and other sites, angry about being slammed unfairly but not wanting to provoke controversy. The Rockefeller in Hermosa Beach has gone public with their hate mail, some of which is from people who haven’t eaten there but slammed…
Read MoreOliver’s Café themed around Dickens’ Oliver Twist
First Look, Strange Concept… When someone told me that Oliver’s Café in Redondo Beach was themed around the Charles Dickens novel Oliver Twist, at first I didn’t believe him. Could there really be a restaurant in the South Bay where the staff dressed as English orphans and the manager was costumed as Fagin? Luckily, they…
Read MoreA La Carte: of Yelp, Rockefeller, Oliver’s, The Crush, The Standing Room, and BarComida
With All Due Respect To Utah… In my review of Barnacles a few weeks ago, I mentioned that it was the only restaurant outside Utah at which I had not been able to get coffee or tea with breakfast. After that review appeared, I was contacted by Lesli Neilsen of the Salt Lake Tribune, who…
Read MoreFrom Cialuzzi to Charlie’s
The name and décor have changed, but the authentic East Coast Italian cooking continues. I was horrified when I went to New York and tried Italian food there. It wasn’t for the reason you might expect – it was excellent. Gone was my certainty that expatriate New Yorkers in LA were just complaining because that…
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