Panelas Brazil Cuisine - Redondo Beach

What's a Redondo Beach neighborhood bistro doing among LA's 101 best?

To be honest, I don't know. I don't know much about Brazilian food, but this was a good place to learn. 

I know all about the Pao de Queijo, the delectable chewy cheese bread. These are on the bigger side, but the texture is spot on. 

Feijoada is a bucket list dish, and this one is my first. A heart stew of black beans, so savory and salty, full of chunks of beef, bone-in ribs, chunks of pork, and slices of sausage. It's a dense dish, and even a few bites can be filling. Mix every bite with rice and farofa for texture, and don't overlook the show-stealing collard greens.

The Brazilian Plate has picanha or a protein of your choice, and it's a pretty good cut of meat. A bit of chewing required but a nice mix with a little fat. Break the egg yolk across the top and eat with all the sides.

I am a little confused about Panelas. I like the food a lot, but I'm not sure it deserves the prestige it gets, up there with the likes of Bestia and Kato. There is a range of price points among LA's 101 Best, but even compared to iconic food trucks like Mariscos Jalisco, I'm not sure Panelas was all that memorable. 

Delicious Food Corner - Irvine, CA

Cantonese comfort food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner...and everything in between. 

Brusque service but also polite. Some flagging down required but only a reasonable amount. 

Start with a Fresh Beef Congee (or any congee you like). Smooth porridge, literally no lumps, a viscous concoction clinging to savory slices of beef. 

Wonton Noodle Soup is a clear broth highlighting wontons filled with super tender porky bits. Love the chewy, hard texture of the noodles as well. 

Pan Fried Rice Noodle Rolls with XO Sauce are all about the texture. Sweet, soft, and chewy beneath a wok-seared crust, with some umami from the sauce. 

HK Style Pineapple Bun with Butter is your classic pastry, and they are serious about the BUTTER. There's a slab so big you think it's a brick of cheese, and melts and soaks into every crevice. I've had better pineapple buns elsewhere, but this one is good enough. 

Why can't they have this closer to LA? I'll take one of these casual cafes where I can pop in with my family any time of day instead of another fancy-schmancy overrated, overpriced, ritzy restaurant any day. 

Marche Moderne - Newport Beach, CA

Their menu is long, with just the entrees taking up an entire page. It's usually a red flag for restaurants that can't commit to a few stellar options, and this one falls in line. The range is vast, the choices are overwhelming, and you get a dose of decision fatigue if you think about it too hard. 

From my two-app, two-entree experience, I'm guessing all options are fine and good, but this level of diversity seems to prevent standouts. 

Hamachi Sashimi Grade & Mangue is a good start. Butter, fatty slices of hamachi are pretty in pink, topped with a mango-yuzu-jalapeno sorbet whose ends up being a touch too strong.

Filet Steak Tartare "Barely Touched" is simple, fresh, savory beef, with some horseradish cream, broken up by sharp bites of very pickled cauliflower. 

Homard a la Thai is exactly as it says. Thai-style via the sweet and soupy red coconut broth, which soaks into the firm bed of forbidden rice. The lobster has so much butter, and if you love lobster as much as I do, this will do. 

Duck Confit is a tender leg, meat shredding off the bone with no need for a knife. It's surrounded by a rich red bordelaise. Floppy sheets of caramelized endive accompany the duck, and I can't say I care for these. They appear to be cut quite crudely, draping over the tines of my fork like soggy napkins.  

Between and Pavlova & A Vacherin is a refreshing shot of sugar, with bitter notes of grapefruit gel and ice cream contrasting the airy crunch of meringue. 

I will always order a souffle if it's offered, and the Chocolate Souffle Cake is a fine decision. A lighter gelato calms the rich, melty chocolate that composes what is essentially the original lava cake but better. 

I like it but I don’t love it. It has all the French classics cooked correctly but not well enough to leave a lasting impression. Service was great, and the overall experience is a nice one, but if I'm ever back in this part of town again, I’d probably try some other options first, especially at this price point. 

Heritage - Long Beach

It’s a simple six-course menu, but two of the courses are dessert. The price seems affordable for a Michelin-starred meal, and I love the relaxed living-room ambiance of this quiet little Long Beach house. There's not a lot of space for tables, but they don't use the space greedily, placing the tables just far enough apart for privacy. 

The meal starts smoothly with a clean Kanpachi Crudo. Beautiful see-through slices of fatty sweetness uplifted by a citrusy pineapple, cooled by slices of celtuse. 

Cannonball Cabbage is covered in soubise and caesar, and it is as unideal as it looks. The cabbage itself has a smoky sweetness that's bold enough to stand alone, but those subtler notes are just soaked with sauce. 

Grilled Diver Scallop is the sole standout, the most tender slices interspersed with geoduck upon a sweet bed of sunchoke. 

Next comes perfectly pink slices of Iberico Pork Presa over a sweet little snap pea puree and a caviar beurre blanc. It's beautiful to look at, and the pork is exceptionally tender. 

And here is where it ends. There's no more dinner to be had, and we switch gears over a bowl of palate-cleansing Blackberry Froyo with its icy shards of pomegranate granita and tangy lemon notes. Remarkably refreshing. 

The last course is a Burnt Sage Honey Cake, with cute little pumpkin cubes and sprinkles of granola crunch. The cake itself is so perfectly crumbly yet moist. 

It’s rare that I criticize portion size, and I often deride the gluttony that fine dining feels the need to provide, but here they give you very little food. If you add up every dish here, including dessert, it’s maybe half a dinner plate. The price seems affordable, but it's quite pricey when you see how little your money buys. 

This food is backed by shiny new Michelin stars, one red and one green to boot.

Except I’m not sure Heritage deserved it. It pains me to say so because I love the concept and the vibe, and I thoroughly enjoyed what little I was given to eat. Although each dish is overall delicious, they seem to play it safe. They had access to the best and freshest ingredients but they made them into things that didn’t offend but also didn’t register. Their sauces are textbook, and their cooking skills are superb, but it's overall unremarkable; the same classics I've been eating for years. 

Silver Lake Ramen - Manhattan Beach

Another ramen place close to my house, known for slinging some pretty good stuff. 

The apps are alright, and you can get a lunch combo that includes a little something before your bowl for only $20.50. The Pork Bun is an option, but the sauce is slathered sloppily and it's a bit too sweet for me. Momofuku it is not, but it's not bad depending on your palate.

Chicken Karaage is great, very crispy and plenty of savory chicken. 

The Classic Ramen is exactly enough for me, a wad of noodles, a slice of pork, and half a soft boiled egg. Bigger eaters may opt for extra noodles or meat. The broth is creamy, almost milky, thinner but not entirely without the savory taste of fat. 

Far as ramens go, this one falls somewhere in the lower middle. Like so much of Silver Lake, it scratches the surface but doesn't have the depth.