Pasta e Pasta - Torrance

While you were waiting in the Pasta Stories' interminable line, this Little Tokyo pasta powerhouse tiptoed past the slow so-so's and opened its doors right across the parking lot. 

Fork up the fan favorite Uni with its clingy cream sauce that coats each strand of spaghetti like a second skin,

or go for the Mentai Cream flavor-bomb. Cod roe makes a strong sea statement, with a flavor that opens in layers and lingers. 

More landlocked palates prefer the Bacon and Mushrooms, which feature a subtle dashi-soy punctuated by bacon bites.

Believe me when I say there are no bad choices here. Get pasta e more pasta on your lunch break or stop by for a casually decadent dinner. 

Trust - Santa Ana, CA

The stone counter seating cradles the kitchen, where three chefs weave in, around, and through, the dance of their three-man show. 

The intimate setting is conducive to conversation, as much or as little as you'd like as how much you engage is entirely up to you. The chefs are professional though informal, knowledgeable yet approachable, and their passion for the food is undeniable. They serve whatever they feel like cooking with whatever their top-notch purveyors have. 

It's clear that they believe in everything they're serving, especially their "freshest bread". The oven-to-plate brioche is a signature starter that reflects their values, their commitment to getting you the freshest food they can. This roll has a smooth-skin like a summer tan, with flaky salt that encrusts it like sand from a summer surf. They move at a feverish pace to plate it, with the goal of getting it into your mouth before the crumb can even settle. Let the steam coalesce on your glasses as it rises from the just-broken bun, and let your fervid fingers feel the burn as you try to glide on some butter.

The Greenest Salad goes so well with this and everything else they make as the freshest veggies of the season include a bounty of snap peas and sharp lettuce with crunchy cukes and edamame, all glued together by avocado goo. It tastes like air and grass and rain, and it's best if consumed throughout the meal as both a side and a palate cleanser.

Asparagus juice runs into a soft slice of Iberico pork. The meat is more often consumed in its cured form, so having it fresh is a treat both smoky and sweet. That said, I'm not sure I'm a fan of this combination as I feel the earthy asparagus neither clashes nor contrasts nor complements this pork. 

The Mussels Croquetas are served with little explanation and minimal fanfare, but they are my surprisingly second-favorite food of the night. There is a fine crumb crust that gives texture to the rich mix of succulent shellfish in cream sauce with a tinge of tomato. I love the flavor-bomb shrimp chunks and mussel bits, and the sauce is just divine. 

We are hit next with the first Paella I have actually liked. The plump rice grains are spread so thin that half of them are socarrat, and they're cooked to be supple but not so much that each grain can't maintain its individuality. The half-crust crunch complements the fleshy fish and its delicate, sea-sweet flavor. 

Patatas Bravas get a lot of press, and it's a lot of talk for a few fat French fries, though the sauces are stuff for thought. There's a rich, dark, deeply-garlic tomato sauce that is bold yet easily addicting, and who doesn't love an awesome aioli. 

The Tortellini are too pretty to eat, hand-folded into flawless tori filled with pork perked up with black pepper and peppery fennel and aromatic herbs like oregano. With the Chinese broccoli, they remind me of a dumpling, and I like them so much I don't think I'll ever go back to boring old cheese. The sauce seems quite Italian, a thicker brodo with just enough lemon to make the mouth pucker most pleasantly. 

It is worth the cost of the entire meal just for the Lamb alone. I’ve never tasted anything like it, these simple chops, just seasoned and with a bit of smoke. We're told that this farm has found a diet (of chicory?) that soothes the gamey flavor and tempers the aftertaste. This meat was clearly lamb, but the flavor was impossibly clean and pure.

Simple slices of Steak signal the end of the meal, but I wish they'd served it first. The lamb is hard to follow, and it's the tempura green beans that steal the show. Deep-frying seems to bolster their green-goddess flavor profile, and the yuzu-kosho sauce is quite the standout.

Dessert starts with Dubai Chocolate Strawberries, which are like the first opener for a somewhat popular concert. The first guy isn't great, and he's playing to the people who are tapping their feet in line for drinks or trying to hype up for the headliner. The crunchies are there, the cream is fluffy and light, but the chocolate on top is heavy and overpowering, and you have to dig to find the relatively few berries. It feels rather hastily thrown together and lacks the deep thought and intention of all the other plates. 

All mediocrity melts away when the true headliners arrives in the form of a Kougin Amman ice cream sandwich. That pastry is perfection, and the ice cream sinks into all those little crannies between the salted layers, which are what makes it so singular. The balance of salt and sugar is satisfying to a spectacular effect, and even now, I can still taste it, over one month later. 

Trust is a likeable place, one you come to for the experience. The abandoned-building, round-counter setting is not so common, and the up close and personal face time with the chefs is hard to find in a world where everything is on a screen and executive chefs split their time between more engagements than there are hours in the day. This does affect the food, as the lack of staff requires preparations be kept simple. You can't have someone stirring a six-hour sauce as three guys against 18 seats don't have a person to spare. So you won't be wowed by the creativity of innovation, but the food is delicious without a doubt, and I do think the facetime with these chefs is worth the price. 

Friends & Family - Hollywood

It seems they’ve scaled down their baking since the raving Eater LA article, but their mid-day, mostly-sold spread still looks quite enticing. 

The Morning Bun is best, simply sugared with a crisp shell housing a hundred tunnels of chewy croissant-like dough within.

Powdered sugar flits over the airy layers of the Raspberry Fairy, and the filling flirts with raspberry flavor for a gel that's more like a whisper. 

There's a glazed lemon-large muffin that's more memorable than the plainer one, and a just-good peanut butter cookie as well. 

I can hardly ever drive to Hollywood, and I don't think I'd go for baked goods alone, but I'm happy to have stopped by while I was parked next door. This bakery is clearly among the better ones in a city with a deep pool of talent, and I'd add that morning bun to my breakfast bests. 

Serving Spoon - Inglewood

It's 11:45 AM on a Wednesday, and there's already a one-hour wait. And judging by the placement of benches in every occupiable space, this is the scene here. Every single day. 

The seater confirms this, saying she arrives on time every morning to push through the already-forming throng of hungry souls at the door. 

Alright, I get it. It is ALL about the ambiance. The big circular booths just radiate laughter and joy, and the counter is full of people coalescing over coffee and devouring their dinner while reading the morning paper.

I love me some chicken wings, and the lunch entree comes with five. The meat is tender, and the fry is right, but I'm not sure they're quite as good as Pann's. The sides, though, the sides you have to try.  The collard greens are great, especially for those who can't stand the pulpy texture. Theirs leaves the leaves cooked, but the light touch keeps them leafy, and they also lack the bitter aftertaste that can often follow. 

Grits are good, and they go great with the Wednesday Oxtail special. The meat is impossibly tender, cooked so long that even the stuff on the bones is gooey goodness made to be gnawed right off. Sadly, the gravy is SO salty, so much so that I have to scrape it off the meat, and the tablespoon of hard rice beneath is hardly going to balance. This is where the grits will save you as they provide the starch you need to soak up the salt. 

The mac and cheese is just what you want - soft without being mushy but has a little chew to it. Candied Yams came highly recommended, and they're just so satisfyingly sweet. 

The Cornbread is super buttery but mine was a little bit dry.

Serving Spoon has had a lot of hype on Eater, and with this visit, my curiosity has been sated. I think that publicity is causing them to overextend themselves a bit, and it shows in the seasoning, but I appreciate them all the same. Just being there is a happy thing, and I would still go back just to eat up some more of that joy.  

Roasted Duck by Pa Ord - Hollywood

"Los Angeles' best roasted duck". Yeah, I'm not so sure. I liked it just fine, but I can't imagine no one does it better. 

For starters, it took them over 30 minutes after opening to even have the duck. Haste makes waste and in their case, it seems haste doesn't make the greatest duck. 

The Single special is a perfect portion for an "I could eat" day, and the dips take the duck from okay to good, between the thick gravy and slight-bite soy. The skin is too oily to crisp, and it's the jade noodles that are the real star, with a very veggie hue and an earthy savor I can still remember. 

I don't know how much duck was ready, but the Spicy Basil Duck Over Rice has maybe 3 chunks, and the rest of the sad little bits look plucked them from a stock that's already been sliced to the bone. There are no real chunks of meat, and the rest is rather dry green beans with few wisps of basil. 

It's a duck spot, but the Fried Pork Belly is the best thing they make. Crispy with no discernible grease, rich and savory with just enough fat for flavor.

Thai Crab Rolls are quite nice, spongy-soft, cushiony crab.

The Papaya Salad is a good one as well, as the flavors taste like they've been pestled, and the spice level is quite authentic. Even the mild had me working up a sweat.

I've been wanting to eat here forever, and it's quite the trek to Hollywood so I had hoped for something a little bit better. I didn't leave hungry, I didn't leave angry, but I did leave rather disappointed. Thai Town has so much else to offer that I'll probably never circle back here again. 

Darkroom - Santa Ana, CA

What a place. What a chef, what a vision. 

The execution is all flawless, a cool room lit by minimalist lighting, music from a turntable where they only play real vinyl from the chef's complete collection. So cool, too cool, a genuine manifestation of a personality, a peek into a soul. 

The menu puts it all out there, and it's a most fascinating read. Each list of ingredients sounds exciting, and despite the detailed descriptions, I can’t really guess what the end result will be. 

Food is in the form of share-plates, and service is quite sensitive, as they pace your pickings to keep them from clashing. 

We start with the Tuna Tartare, which is salted and sweetened and tanged by tomato dashi. A surround-sound chili oil punctuates those flavors, working in tandem with a playfully punchy pickled puntarelle. 

Have you ever seen a Kanpachi more comely? Coffee oil and passionfruit come together for a most fragrant flavor, with notes of citrus and earth.

Proteins preceded the Sugar Snap Peas, wok char clinging to mala, balanced by a creamy peanut miso. It's a sauce so spectacular they could sell it in a jar and I would drink it. 

Take more green bites between small Scotch Olives, these little flavor-bombs but umami anchovy and spicy lamb merguez, made for scooping up some thick, sour yogurt. 

Maitake Mushrooms and Conehead Cabbage are meh in the middle, the seasoning too heavy on both. 

Something about the cabbage doesn't hit - the sauce feels far too heavy, the pecorino a bit too weighty. 

The chimichurri felt too loud for the more delicate mushrooms, and despite loving the buckwheat crunch, the mushroom just felt lost. 

Roe, roe, roe your boat, the Lasagne comes bejeweled, as the dots of glimmer like the finest bijoux. Leeks are sweet, and the broccolini adds the earth. The balance is beautiful, and the roe with its rich flavors filling up the cream sauce makes this the single most memorable thing I've eaten in years. The chef gives me a casual shrug and tells me it's just lasagna with a Scandinavian spin, but I can't imagine what fever dream led to something so sophisticated and so original. 

Even the Caesar salad has its own unique spin, sharply bitter bunches of little gems drizzled with nuts and cheese and nutty cheese. 

Note: I got this one to go for the hubby - the plating is in a take-home box. 

Our last main dish is crispy Beelers Pork Belly, cooked to perfection, with melt-in-your-mouth fat and a "green curry stuff" that supplants all the other stuff. It's not the most creative, just a meat and sauce but it is a most delightful nosh. 

Desert is almost a digestif, so light is the strawberry goo. It surrounds the savory Semifreddo like a bubbly-wrap of sweet and tart.

Before I came to Darkroom, I was losing faith in fine dining. After yet another lackluster experience at a lauded LA hotspot, I was starting to lose faith in food. I so often found menus lacking in creativity, palatability, or both, and it seemed that the good stuff was not so creative and those who were creative forgot how to make it taste good.

But this single visit to Darkroom changed my mind. They treat every person like they matter and deliver a passionate, masterful menu that made me excited to eat for the first time in months. It seems this one dark place pulled me out of another, and I'm already making plans to return for another round. 

Holbox UPDATE - Los Angeles

A cashier and a counter, food stalls surrounding, communal dining area all around. Holbox is simply a stall in the grand scheme of Mercado a la Paloma, a powerhouse seafood service so good even Michelin had to give a star. 

It's a rather long menu for a stall, but they don't have any throwaways. It's a list of overwhelmingly delicious descriptions so just start with a ceviche if you need time to think. The Mixto has such succulent shrimp, meaty octopus, and a sole so fresh it melts in your mouth. The lime is tart but not burn-your-mouth sour, playing with the sweeter flavors of the shrimp and sole and adding a bit more pop to the pulpo. 

Savor between sips of Sparkling Lemonade, a substantial 5-dollar delight that's refreshing and smooth. It's easy to drink, maybe a bit to easy as the bathroom is a bit of walk toward the back.

More ceviche with a buttery sea-meat Kanpachi & Uni Tostada, as their house made hot sauce has a punch. 

Uni is great, but Smoked Kanpachi is exceptional. You can feel the cleanest smoke sate the senses, as shrimp and scallops add sweet to the savor and smoke. 

Barely-briny bay-scallop bullets bathe in an emerald emulsion. Loud lime and perky pepper accent the Aguachile. 

From raw to cooked, the Smoked Kanpachi Taco is tantalizing on the tongue. The smoke spirals all around the buttery, almost-gooey fish. 

The Scallop Taco has milder flavors, with caramelized onions and a creamy sauce, giving the seared scallop some space to speak for itself. 

Have you ever seen a Pulpo so pretty? A spectacular mass most tentacular atop a nutty pepper sauce, this may just be the best octopus I've ever eaten. 

$150 for food worth three times more, two gluttons stuffed to the gills with a couple of boxes for some very tasty bits. Not only is Holbox the best seafood in town, it is by far the cheapest. Considering all I have to do is order at the counter for no-fuss, unpretentious plates of the freshest seafood in town, I see no reason to go anywhere else ever again.