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Pre-Infant Dining Report

In January, I told you about our plans to do some Pre-Infant dining before the birth of our first child. We are down to the final week or two B.C. (Before Child). According to our credit card bills, we have done pretty well. I haven’t done a good job of updating here, so I will give a quick run down.

La Botte
I did Write about this one. Dinner was fantastic, definitely not somewhere I would bring an infant. The tables are pretty close together, not uncomfortably, more intimately. Also, much diaper money was spent on the dinner, but it was definitely worth it.

Literati II
Also wrote about this dinner. The food was great, service was terrible. That being said, this actually is a place you could take an infant. The restaurant is loud and there were a number of kids there when we ate dinner. Odds are that we will be back eventually, I would like to give them another chance.

The Nook
I didn’t write about the dinners we had since being pregnant, but I have written about The Nook before. We had a couple dinners at The Nook, both of them fantastic. The soup at The Nook is the untold hero, I suggest ordering it everytime. For these two dinners I had a white bean chipotle soup and a creative summer squash soup with a hint of mint. unfortunately, The Nook is not a good place to take an infant. The space is small and not suited for a small baby carrier. That’s ok though, we will save The Nook for date nights with a babysitter.

Joe’s (for brunch)
Joe’s Brunch was not only a terrific place to go pre-infant, but will be a nice outing with the infant. We hit up Joe’s twice during the pregnancy. The last time we were there, we saw a little infant on the patio, sleeping soundly next to the sounds of the fountain. The write up for one of our brunches here.

Fraiche
Fraiche was high on our list to try and we made it over there last month for dinner after waiting I think a month to get our reservation. This is definitely not a place to take an infant for a number of reasons. The first being that I think the host might kick us right out the door. As it was, we were essentially rushed out after finishing our desserts. The host stood, glaring at us, while the bus boy cleared everything from in front of us, including water glasses that we were still drinking out of. Overall the service was pretty terrible all night, absent waiter, having to tackle the busboy for water and no offer of coffee with our desserts. Now the food was another story, very good, if a little over priced. For the money, I would probably go back to La Botte. The absolute star were the desserts though. We ordered four different desserts for four people and polished them all off — and not because they were small. My chocolate pavlova was divine.

The Counter
We have made a couple trips here for a burger and some sweet potato fries. This will definitely be a place to go with an infant, although we promise not to CHANGE A DIAPER ON THE BENCH SEAT like we saw one couple doing. We watched in horror while the baby’s naked buns were pointed at another diner.

Le Petit Cafe
Always solid food and good French food and sauces. Too cramped to bring an infant, but not really the right venue for a little one anyway.

Osteria Mozza
Glad that we made it to Mozza before starting in earnest to save for college and worry about testing my life insurance policy by clogging my arteries. Incredibly flavorful and creative dishes, tight space and lots of buzz around the restaurant. I have the feeling that they wouldn’t mind if you brought an infant, but this isn’t really the kind of place I would want to go — in case we have a screamer and have to trade off going outside. I would go here for a special occasion date night, with a baby sitter. Pizzeria Mozza might be more comfortable with an infant, but again, tight space and not much room to stash a baby seat.

Abode
We went here for the DineLA meal. The food was good and definitely worth the $34 price for the three courses. We were particularly impressed by the cheese plate and the study in chocolate. Looking at the normal menu, I can’t see us going back. The food was good, but normal prices were way high. Also, the atmosphere is a bit too stuffy for me. Along with the atmosphere, the service wasn’t too inviting.

Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse
Another of our DineLA meals. We were lucky that the DineLA event coincided with our pre-infant dining tour. Not that $34 is a low cost dinner, but it was a good way to try some places that we normally wouldn’t have. Ruth’s Chris is definitely a place you could take an infant. It’s fairly noisy, there is generally room at the tables, especially if you get a both. I’m not normally a patron of steakhouses, so I doubt that we would make a trip back here with the little guy, plus the normal prices are a bit high.

There are more restaurants, I will give a quick update when I think of them. I would also like to note, when I say I could bring an infant to a restaurant, I mean a little infant. I don’t mean bringing a teething baby or toddler to a nice restaurant, just one the sleeps the whole time. I’m certain that our dining routines will change, but I’m looking forward to a new era in our lives!

By Jonah (see more of his posts). Jonah is the founder of la.foodblogging and also created Digesty, a food blog aggregator and Cheww.com, a spam free foodblog search engine.

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