Birthday @ Upstairs 2

I took the BF out for a surprise birthday dinner last night to a nearby restaurant called Upstairs 2. It’s actually part of the Wine House which is downstairs. The place features tapas-sized plates of food as (obviously) a variety of wines.
They were offering a prix fixe menu that night and the items on [...]

Quickie Lunch @ Misasa

When I get the craving to eat some no-frills Japanese food, I head to Mitsuwa Marketplace on Centinela and Venice. Usually, I order something from the highly regarded Santouka, but I wanted something different from ramen this time. Enter the katsu-don from Misasa:

Misasa is on the far corner from the entrance when you [...]

Bar Hayama

Despite living within walking distance of Bar Hayama, I finally went for the first time last night for dinner. The outside is unassuming and easy to miss, but inside is a nice spacious shelter from the traffic on Sawtelle. The seats around the large fire pit were already taken, but we nabbed a table [...]

Pho Show

Pho Show just had their grand opening this week, so I went to visit for dinner tonight since it’s so close to my office. Since it’s on the west side and it is called Pho Show, I didn’t go in with my expectations too high.

While waiting for the rest of my party to arrive, [...]

Musha (Santa Monica)

I had dinner at Musha, an izakaya in Santa Monica, recently and wanted to highlight some or our favorites on the menu. The place is small and gets pretty crowded at night so we made a reservation a day or so beforehand just so we didn’t have to wait thirty to sixty minutes for [...]

Hotel Dining — The Park Grill at the Intercontinental

[photo from their website]
I occasionally like to imbibe a cocktail or dine in a hotel. It feels extra glamorous and I can pretend I’m a traveller in a foreign land. So when a visiting friend suggested we meet for lunch at the Hotel Intercontinental, on Avenue of the Stars, [...]

New to the Westside: FOOD

So I haven’t actually had a full meal at this place yet, but based on my first short experience with it, I think it looks very promising, and I want to spread the word to help these people out.
I was going to Kay n’ Dave’s with a couple of friends tonight, and we parked [...]

dineLA Recap: Ford’s Filling Station

Ford’s Filling Station
9531 Culver Blvd., 90232
(310) 202-1470
$34 + tax, tip
Bottom line: Yum.
This is the food I love to eat. These are fresh, well-seasoned, unpretentious, and simple dishes borne of a deep hunger within, not of some intellectual curiosity or misinformed science project — I walked out of Ford’s Filling Station last night at 11 pm [...]