The Top 100 Places to Eat Near Chef Tony

A large window into the kitchen lets you watch steam rise off the bamboo stackers all day long, which sets the mood nicely for this casual dim sum shop in an Arcadia strip mall. Everything is ordered from a menu rather than plucked from carts, so bring a plan. The team behind Sea Harbour in Rosemead runs this one, and regulars who know that pedigree tend to fill the tables early on weekends.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Fish flies in from Japan twice a week, and regulars have quietly done the math: Friday is the move. This casual sushi shop in an Arcadia strip mall runs more like a busy Tokyo lunch counter than a hushed omakase temple, with a line at the door, servers moving fast, and chefs who don't waste motion. The nigiri rice is notably generous and soft. Counter or table, omakase or a la carte, the energy is the same.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Chinese Restaurant Awards Top 50 Honourees · Elite 30 Canada

1. Time Out The best Chinese restaurants in America
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
3. Time Out #26 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

Doors open at 11:30 and close a few hours later, which tells you everything: this small Taiwanese restaurant in Temple City operates on its own terms, and the lines that form before opening tell you the neighborhood is fine with that. The menu hangs above the cash register, so you read it standing up. Tea arrives in a Styrofoam cup without asking. Expect to be out in twenty minutes, holding a Michelin Bib Gourmand memory.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

The strip-mall facade on Las Tunas gives nothing away, but inside, the room goes full imperial, red and gold and blue, with the kind of scale that makes you feel a dinner party is the minimum viable unit. This is fine dining rooted in royal Manchu cuisine from the Qing court, so luxury ingredients arrive without apology. Come with a crowd and order widely; the menu rewards the ambitious table. A Michelin Guide selected restaurant.

1. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles
2. Los Angeles Times #88 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

Dim sum ordered off a menu rather than flagged down from a cart means everything arrives from the steamer still properly hot, which sounds obvious until you've had the other kind. This Cantonese seafood restaurant in Rosemead holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand and draws the kind of crowd that fills large round tables for both weekend dim sum and proper evening dinners. The seafood is the reason to stay through dinner.

1. Chinese Restaurant Awards #6 · Elite 30 Canada
2. James Beard Awards 2022 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: California · Tony Ho

A sign-in sheet on the sidewalk is your first clue that this strip-mall dumpling shop in Monrovia runs on its own terms. The menu is short, roughly half of it devoted to the namesake specialty, and the kitchen makes everything fresh each morning rather than pulling from a freezer. The pan-fried options tend to disappear fastest. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand, which explains the lines without quite preparing you for them.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Ordering here happens on a tablet, which suits the no-frills dining room just fine because the Chinese noodle shop menu is the whole point. The rou jia mo, a flatbread sandwich stuffed with slow-cooked Kurobuta pork, is the kind of street food that makes you forget every other errand you had planned. Braised beef noodles and soup dumplings round out the things you'll feel obligated to order. Rosemead strip mall, easy parking, zero pretension.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles

The menu at this tiny Arcadia noodle shop is short by design, because the kitchen is doing exactly one thing: Shanxi-style hand-pulled noodles, springy and chewy in a way that dried pasta simply isn't. The pork belly and fermented soy number has regulars arguing over what to call it. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, cash-and-carry energy, and a strip mall address that filters out anyone not paying attention.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

A scarlet lobster logo, shells painted gold and silver on the wall, and half the tables splitting one at any given hour make the signature self-evident at this Cantonese restaurant in Alhambra. Henry's is an unassuming room doing homestyle cooking that's increasingly hard to find, selected by the Michelin Guide and named to the LA Times' 101 best. Come at dinner when the full menu opens up, and ask what vegetables are in season.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
3. Time Out #34 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Eater The Best Soft Serve in Los Angeles

The chewy, seafood-studded rice noodles are a reason to organize a group dinner in San Gabriel, which is exactly how this Southeast Asian seafood restaurant operates best. Chinese, Thai, Cambodian, and Vietnamese cooking styles all converge on one very long menu, and the servers genuinely steer you away from decision paralysis. Salt and pepper crab is the move, but the beef loc lac quietly earns its table space too. Selected by the Michelin Guide.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Chengdu Taste does not negotiate with your spice tolerance. This Alhambra Sichuan restaurant has been packing in crowds for years without once softening its approach, and the dining room smells like chili oil and vindication. Toothpick lamb, heavy with cumin, is the move that everyone talks about. The Michelin Bib Gourmand is on record here, and lunch is the local's trick for skipping the line that forms most evenings.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Time Out #36 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

Sichuan cooking in a bright, window-lined room in Alhambra, where the mapo tofu and tea-smoked duck have followed loyalists from the old address a couple miles away. The kitchen runs on scarlet numbing oils and chopped chilis, and a bowl of fish in rattan pepper broth will leave your lips buzzing in the best possible, er, notable way. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, and a private room handles large parties well.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

No carts circle the dining room at this Alhambra dim sum house, which tells you something about how seriously the kitchen takes the whole operation. Orders come by menu, servers move fast, and the lobster noodle roll arrives on a platter dressed with the shell itself, a small piece of theater that gets noticed across the room. The Michelin Guide awarded it a Bib Gourmand, and the crowd on a weekend morning is exactly what you'd expect.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

The line outside this small Malaysian café in Alhambra is the first thing you notice, and it doesn't thin out much once you're in. The menu is short and focused on classics: Hainanese chicken, curry with roti canai, kaya toast. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand, which feels about right for a neighborhood spot where the takeout tickets never stop piling up. Come with patience and without a reservation, because neither option exists.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. AAA Four Diamonds

The parking lot fills fast and the wait on weekends is real, but this Cantonese noodle shop in Rosemead moves its crowd along with the confidence of a place that has never needed dim sum carts to draw a line. Everything arrives hot and carefully seasoned, from steamed buns packed with char siu to rice noodle rolls that most tables order twice. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, and priced like they forgot to notice.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles

Edison bulbs cast a warm amber glow over exposed brick in this Old Pasadena Italian restaurant, where all the pasta is made in house and the portions lean toward sharing whether you planned to or not. The spaghetti and meatballs arrives on a platter the size of a hubcap. The cooking is bold rather than fussy, the sourcing is local, and the Michelin Guide has given it a Bib Gourmand to prove it isn't a secret anymore.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

The coffered wood ceiling and vintage frames make this downtown Pasadena bistro feel like someone airlifted a Parisian side street into Southern California. The chef has no interest in deconstructing the classics, which means Burgundy snails arrive glossy with herbed butter and duck à l'orange stays duck à l'orange. Order the soufflé for dessert; it takes time and it's supposed to. The Michelin Guide has it listed.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times #89 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

You walk through a working cheesery to get to your table, which sets the tone for everything that follows. Agnes is a rustic American bistro in Pasadena where a live-fire hearth anchors the room and the menu leans on local produce, house-made pasta, and fried chicken with sambal hot honey. Save room for the Thai banana split, which sounds like a dare and eats like a plan.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Eater The Best New Restaurants in America
2. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America
3. Eater Best Comeback · The 2025 Eater Los Angeles Award Winners

1. Food & Wine McSatan · Best Dishes Our Editors Ate This Year
2. Los Angeles Times #53 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles
3. Los Angeles Times Poseidon taco · The 101 Best Tacos in Los Angeles

1. Los Angeles Times #101 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Eater Best Bakeries
2. Eater Best Hometown Bakery · The 2025 Eater Los Angeles Award Winners

1. James Beard Awards 2022 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Baker · Joseph, Archalous, and Caroline Geragosian

Jon Yao's tasting menu restaurant lives in the Row DTLA, where polished concrete and an open kitchen set a spare stage for cooking rooted in Taiwanese heritage and San Gabriel Valley muscle memory. The ten courses are not shy about seasoning, and the drinks program, a James Beard winner in its own right, pulls equal weight. Kato holds a Michelin star and a spot on North America's 50 Best, and Yao won the James Beard for Best Chef: California.

1. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
2. James Beard Awards 2026 · Winner · Outstanding Wine and Other Beverages Program
3. 50 Best #49 · North America's 50 Best Restaurants

1. Los Angeles Times #95 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

Named for a Caribbean island off the Yucatán coast, this Michelin-starred coastal Mexican seafood counter sits inside Mercado La Paloma in South Central, sharing the space with six other vendors and no liquor license, so lemonade it is. The chef grew up spearing fish on that same peninsula, and the ceviches, aguachiles, and grilled lobster on heirloom corn tortillas taste like it. North America's 50 Best lists it at number 26.

1. James Beard Awards 2026 · Nominee · Outstanding Chef · Gilberto Cetina
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star
3. 50 Best #26 · North America's 50 Best Restaurants

1. Sprudgie Awards 2025 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

One seating a night, a handful of seats, and a reservation that requires the patience of a monk. This is a two-Michelin-starred omakase counter in a strip mall on East 7th, where the chef sources, slices, and explains every course himself, plating on Japanese pottery from his personal collection. The menu chases the season hard, and the sake list runs deep for anyone who wants to go down that road with it.

1. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
2. James Beard Awards 2023 · Nominee · Best Chef: California · Brandon Hayato Go
3. Los Angeles Times #5 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Sprudgie Awards 2025 · Finalist · Best New Cafe

1. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

You get instructions in advance on how to find the entrance, which sets the tone for what follows inside. Restaurant Ki is a ten-seat contemporary Korean tasting menu tucked into downtown LA, where the chef pulls global technique into Korean foundations without making a fuss about it. It holds a Michelin star, and a James Beard nomination for Best New Restaurant didn't hurt its reputation either. Worth finding the door.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. World Culinary Awards 2025 · Nominee · North America's Best New Restaurant
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Nominee · Best New Restaurant

1. Sprudgie Awards 2025 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

1. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Best New Cafe

1. Sprudgie Awards 2025 · Finalist · Best New Cafe
2. US Coffee Championships #2 · U.S. Brewers Cup · Christian Bak

1. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

Seats at the chef's counter let you watch the whole operation unfold at this sleek DTLA tasting menu spot from the husband-and-wife team behind it. The look is concrete floors and black-and-white walls, the format is modern Korean, and the pairings run alcoholic or not. The Los Angeles Times ranked it third on their list of the city's best restaurants in 2025, and the James Beard Foundation nominated the chef for Best Chef: California.

1. Eater The All-Time Eater 38
2. James Beard Awards 2026 · Nominee · Best Chef: California · Kwang Uh
3. Eater The Best New Restaurants in America

Finding Sushi Kaneyoshi, tucked into a basement of Little Tokyo, is half the evening. Once you locate it, the counter is serene and minimalist in the way that signals a serious omakase, and Chef Yoshiyuki Inoue fires a Michelin star from behind it. He throws pottery himself, and some of that handmade ceramics holds the courses. Every detail gets this treatment, down to the miso soup you'd normally ignore.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. Time Out #16 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now
3. Los Angeles Times #24 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

Tucked into Mandarin Plaza on Broadway, this contemporary Chinese American restaurant and bar is the project of a first-generation chef cooking his own story onto the plate. The cocktail program is serious enough to earn national bartender recognition, so start there before the food arrives. Dishes are built for sharing, the kitchen is open to the room, and the whole setup feels more like a dinner party than a transaction.

1. Esquire Bartender of the Year · Kenzo Han
2. World Culinary Awards 2025 · Nominee · North America's Best New Restaurant
3. Punch Best New Bartenders · Kenzo Han

A rainbow bull's head salvaged from the original location watches over the 14-seat counter like a totem, and that detail tells you everything about the mood here. Somni is a Spanish creative tasting menu in a converted bungalow just off Santa Monica, with three Michelin stars and a courtyard that feels like it was designed inside a dream. The chef trained at El Bulli, and the cooking lands accordingly: intricate, theatrical, and dead serious about having fun.

1. Michelin Guide 3 Stars
2. 50 Best #46 · North America's 50 Best Restaurants
3. The Infatuation #2 · The Top-Rated New Restaurants

Satsuki rice porridge finished with parmesan cream and uni tells you everything about what Josef Centeno is doing at this prix-fixe counter in Downtown LA. Italian and Japanese cooking share more DNA than people expect, and this Michelin-starred omakase-style room leans into that overlap with crudos brightened by fruit and herbs and seafood that reads Mediterranean one bite and Japanese the next. The open kitchen keeps it intimate, which is a polite way of saying you'll want to be paying attention.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. Los Angeles Times #25 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles
3. Time Out #12 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

Inch-thick pan pizzas baked to order out of a tiny Echo Park shop with a vinyl and cassette collection on the walls. Quarter Sheets draws a crowd serious enough that a wait is part of the deal, and the pastries from the team's baker, a James Beard semifinalist, are a genuine surprise at a pizza counter. The Michelin Guide gave it a Bib Gourmand, and the New York Times put it on their restaurant list. Wear whatever you'd wear to a friend's place.

1. Food & Wine Best New Chefs · Hannah Ziskin
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
3. The New York Times The Restaurant List

Dark-wood paneling and a white marble antipasti counter signal that this is not your red-checkered-tablecloth Italian place. Nancy Silverton's Melrose osteria holds a Michelin star and takes bread and mozzarella with a seriousness most kitchens reserve for the main course. The pastas are the draw for regulars, but the team is equally intent on pulling you toward the less obvious corners of the Italian table.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. Wine Enthusiast Forward 50 Restaurants
3. Time Out #11 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Los Angeles Times #98 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

The brick-and-skylight nave of a former bakery on La Brea sets the stage for one of those all-day operations that actually pulls off both halves. Mornings belong to the pastry counter, where the team's James Beard Award-winning work draws lines before the doors open. By evening the open kitchen is running a Southern European Mediterranean menu for a full dining room that never quite empties.

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Winner · Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker · Margarita Manzke
2. World Culinary Awards 2025 · Nominee · North America's Best Brunch Venue
3. Time Out The best bakeries in America

1. James Beard Awards 2024 · Winner · Best Chef: California · Lord Maynard Llera
2. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants
3. Time Out #19 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Sprudgie Awards 2023 · Finalist · Best New Cafe

Salt-and-pepper-crusted brisket smoked in the Austin tradition is the reason people line up at this Lincoln Heights barbecue shop. What started as a weekend backyard hobby grew into a proper room with a craft beer bar to keep you company while you wait. The Michelin Bib Gourmand is on record, and the James Beard committee has taken notice too. Come early; things sell out, and "we ran out" is the one review nobody wants.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
3. Los Angeles Times #41 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

Sweet smoke from the grill drifts across a Highland Park parking lot, and the line at this taqueria doesn't move an inch. The queso taco, built on a blue corn masa tortilla and finished with a melted skirt of Monterey Jack, is the reason most people are here. The homemade salsas run from bright to ferociously spicy. A few picnic tables outside, a Bib Gourmand on the record, and tacos that arrive colorful and structurally ambitious.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Los Angeles Times Pierna de pollo queso taco · The 101 Best Tacos in Los Angeles

1. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

Two wood-burning ovens run the show at this Glassell Park Southern restaurant, and nearly everything on the menu passes through them at some point. Oysters, cornbread, pork chops, braised greens that bubble by the coals all night. Long communal tables and wax candles fill the main room; counter seats face the kitchen. A quieter wine bar in the back serves a shorter menu for anyone who wants the vibe at half the volume.

1. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California

1. James Beard Awards 2026 · Nominee · Emerging Chef · Fátima Juárez
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
3. The New York Times Molotes de Plátano · The Best Restaurant Dishes We Ate Across the U.S.

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Winner · Outstanding Wine and Other Beverages Program
2. Wine Enthusiast Forward 50 Restaurants

1. Food & Wine Best New Chefs · Wedchayan "Deau" Arpapornnopparat
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now

A no-reservations Portuguese spot in Cypress Park where the counter seats facing the open kitchen fill up fast and everyone else negotiates the small room. The menu leans on family recipes and sharing plates, with salt cod fritters and charred cabbage over white beans doing a lot of the heavy lifting. A James Beard semifinalist in multiple years, including Best New Restaurant, which tracks for a place this small running this confidently.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurateur · Holly Fox and Adam Weisblatt - Last Word Hospitality
3. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Best New Restaurant

1. Los Angeles Times #63 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

Eleven seats at a counter, hidden behind a door inside Bar 109 in Melrose Hill, with reservations that will take some planning to secure. Corridor 109 is a seafood tasting counter where the chef draws mostly from Japanese fisheries, serving much of it raw with a Japanese-leaning sensibility. The single non-seafood course, wagyu over oxtail jus, lands near the end like a punctuation mark on an otherwise ocean-driven menu.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

A repurposed warehouse in the Arts District with polished concrete, exposed brick, and enough trailing greenery that you half-forget you're surrounded by industrial bones. Damian is a full-service Mexican restaurant where the kitchen takes the cuisine seriously without making you feel lectured about it. The terrace fills fast, the cocktails are sharp, and the fish taco quietly outclasses everything you thought you knew about fish tacos.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Time Out #7 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now
3. Los Angeles Times #21 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

A hand-cranked rotisserie sits at the center of the open kitchen, which tells you most of what you need to know about this Italian restaurant on Beverly. The room has the warm, dark energy of a place that knows it's good, with backlit booths and a crowd that books early. Hearty pastas, big proteins, and vegetables that actually want to be there. The New York Times put it on their LA list, and the Los Angeles Times ranked it in their top ten statewide.

1. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurant
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California

1. Punch Best New Bartenders · Kevin Nguyen
2. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants
3. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America

Red curtains separate the bar from the dining room at this Michelin-starred Hollywood steakhouse on Melrose, and the lipstick carpet does the rest of the atmosphere's heavy lifting. Kevin Meehan reimagined Kali as an old-school steakhouse, so Creekstone Farms beef anchors the menu while beef tartare and crème brûlée handle the opening and closing arguments. The loaded potato, baked then fried to order, is not a thing to skip.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

The building was once a post office, and the beamed ceilings still carry that civic grandeur, now filled with the noise of a Cal-Ital neighborhood restaurant doing brisk, happy business. The open kitchen anchors a room that works equally well for a date or a loud group. Focaccia arrives complimentary and is the kind you actually remember. Freshly made pasta leads into mains grilled over almond wood, the whole menu moving at an easy, convivial pace.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. The New York Times Taco al Pastor · The Best Restaurant Dishes We Ate Across the U.S.
2. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Condé Nast Traveler The best new restaurants in the world
2. The New York Times The Restaurant List
3. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America

The sunny yellow exterior and orange canopy on the corner of Melrose are hard to miss, which is fitting because neither is the pizza inside. Nancy Silverton's pizzeria has been an LA institution forever, with bare wood tables, skylights, and a Bib Gourmand to its name. The pies come out of the oven with puffy, golden edges, and the seasonal dessert selection runs deep enough to cause genuine indecision.

1. Eater The All-Time Eater 38
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Tangled greenery, trance music, and moody lighting set the scene at Jordan Kahn's tasting menu restaurant on Melrose, where the room feels like a forest you wandered into by accident. The cooking is live-fire and zero-waste, pulling from sustainably sourced wild and organic ingredients, and the drinks follow the same logic, no refined sugars anywhere. It holds a Michelin star, which tracks for food this particular about its own convictions.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

The No. 19, a hot pastrami on rye with Swiss, coleslaw, and Russian dressing, is the thing strangers stop you to ask about when you're carrying it to your table. Langer's is an old-school deli, been around forever, with booths, a full menu of latkes and chopped liver, and breakfast served all day. The Michelin Guide gives it a Bib Gourmand, which feels about right for a place where the sandwich does all the talking.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
3. Time Out #40 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

Persian crispy rice arrives with egg yolks that make sharing a genuine moral dilemma. Kismet is a casual Middle Eastern restaurant on Hollywood Boulevard where seasonal vegetables and bright flavors run the show, and nothing on the table feels heavy. The Michelin Bib Gourmand room draws a Los Feliz crowd that looks like they biked here and also know exactly what they're ordering. The staff matches the energy perfectly.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
3. Los Angeles Times #27 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

The tenth floor of a downtown hotel turns out to be a fine place to stare at Walt Disney Concert Hall while José Andrés's team works through a menu of modern Californian cooking with a Spanish lean. The facade opens fully, making the room feel more rooftop than restaurant. A Forbes Four Star. Earth tones, greenery, a busy bar, and a tomato tartare that arrives looking like the beef version but absolutely is not.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Chris Bianco, the Phoenix pizza legend, brought his wood-fired pies to Los Angeles and the lines haven't stopped since. This is a pizza shop in ROW DTLA with a handful of pies on the menu, a takeout window, and outdoor seats where people happily eat standing up over open boxes. The Michelin Guide gave it a Bib Gourmand, which should settle the New York argument. Lunch adds sandwiches; the antipasto platter fills the gaps.

1. Foodist Awards 2025 · Food Pioneer · Chris Bianco
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
3. Los Angeles Times #68 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

Jordan Kahn's two-Michelin-star tasting menu operates inside a structure Culver City locals call "The Waffle," a red steel lattice that looks like it landed from somewhere with better architecture. The food inside is just as committed to the bit: courses that are visually theatrical and technically serious, edible flowers floating in tomato water, flavors that feel like they were calibrated rather than cooked. Dress accordingly; this is not a casual Tuesday.

1. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
2. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants
3. Los Angeles Times #33 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Food & Wine Turkish Coffee Cream Pie · Best Dishes Our Editors Ate This Year

No ocean in sight from this busy East Hollywood corner, but the seafood at Found Oyster doesn't seem to notice. It's a no-frills bar and seafood spot where the team applies a firm philosophy: impeccably sourced shellfish needs little beyond a squeeze of lemon to do its job. The oysters come from the general manager's family farm, which is either charming or unfair competition, depending on how you look at it. The New York Times and the LA Times have both taken notice.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
3. Los Angeles Times #78 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

The thing that sets this West Pico pizza shop apart is the cornicione, puffy and pinched with a mochi-like chew that signals the Japan-meets-Italy premise before you've taken a proper bite. Individual pies come red or white, traditional or quietly strange, and a counter with a front-row view of the prep keeps the room honest. Ranked second in the country by 50 Top Pizza USA, Pizzeria Sei draws a crowd that treats a Tuesday like a reservation worth keeping.

1. 50 Top Pizza #9 · 50 Top Pizza World
2. 50 Top Pizza 2025 · Pizza Maker of the Year · 50 Top Pizza World Special Awards
3. 50 Top Pizza #2 · 50 Top Pizza USA

The clay pot of three-cup Jidori chicken arrives at your table still simmering, which tells you everything about how seriously this casual Taiwanese restaurant takes itself. Exposed brick, concrete floors, and a laid-back South LA vibe don't telegraph the kitchen's precision, but the Michelin Bib Gourmand does. Vegetarian takes on mapo tofu and dumplings hold their own alongside the meat dishes, and the lotus root salad is quietly worth ordering.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
3. Los Angeles Times #76 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. The New York Times 22 of the Best Bakeries Across the U.S. Right Now

A single pasta course, spaghetti with abalone and black truffle, never rotates off Niki Nakayama's menu at this intimate kaiseki tasting room in Culver City. Everything else shifts with the seasons, moving through delicate broths and grilled Miyazaki wagyu in a long, unhurried procession. Getting a table is a project in itself, but Nakayama comes out at the end to say hello, which feels less like a formality and more like the point. It holds a Michelin star.

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Nominee · Outstanding Chef · Niki Nakayama
2. James Beard Awards 2026 · Nominee · Outstanding Chef · Niki Nakayama
3. Michelin Guide 1 Star

1. Time Out The best bakeries in America

An Echo Park izakaya with exposed red brick and a sake list the servers are eager to walk you through. The menu is built for sharing, running from chawanmushi with dungeness crab to grilled skewers and delicate tempura, all of it casual in presentation and careful in execution. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, and ranked among the Los Angeles Times' top restaurants in the state. Book well clear of a Dodgers home game unless you enjoy circling the block.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
3. Los Angeles Times #37 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

String lights and climbing vines turn the back patio into the kind of dinner setting that makes you forget you're in the middle of a city. Alta Adams is a Southern restaurant on the West Adams corridor, and the kitchen cooks with the confidence of someone who has been making fried chicken and coconut cake their whole life. Portions run generous, which makes it a natural for groups. The chef was a James Beard semifinalist for Best Chef: California.

1. Eater The All-Time Eater 38
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Los Angeles Times #44 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Time Out The best bakeries in America

1. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants
2. Eater The Best New Restaurants in America
3. Time Out #4 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

A wood-burning oven does the heavy lifting at this intimate Italian steakhouse tucked into Nancy Silverton's Melrose compound. The kitchen leans hard into live fire and big cuts, with cooking that's boldly seasoned and more seasonal than you'd expect from a place where meat is basically the religion. The wine list runs deep into Italy. Booking is tight, and the room fills fast with people who clearly did not come to order a salad.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
3. Time Out #14 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

A lineup of house sambals lands on the table before you've made any decisions, which is a useful way to begin at this easygoing Malaysian restaurant on Beverly. Chef Johnny Lee's Chinese-Malaysian cooking runs from satay and charred okra to beef rendang with buttery roti, and the plates are sized for sharing, which softens the slightly higher tabs. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The Infatuation #9 · LA’s Best New Restaurants
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurateur · Holly Fox and Adam Weisblatt - Last Word Hospitality

1. The Infatuation 11 Of The Best Donuts In America

The photo wall by the door, stacked with chefs, actors, and politicians, tells you everything about how long Park's has been the go-to Korean BBQ spot in LA. Servers manage the tabletop grills for you, slicing and flipping prime cuts from bulgogi to galbi, with American Wagyu for the committed. The kimchi pancakes arrive on cast-iron skillets, hot and crisp, and the cold noodles cut through all that smoke.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
3. Time Out #29 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants
2. Eater The Best New Restaurants in America
3. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles

1. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Emerging Chef · Danielle Duran-Zecca and Alessandro Zecca
2. James Beard Awards 2025 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: California · Danielle Duran Zecca

Boat noodles are the draw at this Thai noodle shop tucked into a Hollywood strip mall, where the broth runs thick, dark, and serious, and you pick your protein, noodle type, and heat level before the bowl hits the table. The portions are small by design, which is the shop's way of nudging you toward ordering two. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, and on the LA Times 101 list. The stir-fried holy basil with pork is not an afterthought.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America
3. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California

A French-leaning wine list runs deep at this cozy New American bistro on Western, but the kitchen earns its share of the attention. The menu is short and seasonal, built around what the market turned up that week rather than any fixed idea of itself. The cooking is restrained in the way that actually requires confidence. Wine Enthusiast named it one of the top new restaurants in 2025, and the Michelin Guide has it selected.

1. Wine Enthusiast Top 50 New Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Los Angeles Times #59 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

A Michelin-starred bistro in the Arts District where the steak au poivre and golden frites hold their ground alongside some genuinely inventive plating. The kitchen leans French but isn't reverent about it, which is part of the appeal. The Provence Martini made Esquire's list of the finest in the country, so the bar pulls its weight too. It fills up fast and the open kitchen keeps the room loud and kinetic.

1. Esquire Provence Martini · The Best Martinis in America
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Time Out #18 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. The New York Times The Restaurant List
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
3. Los Angeles Times #18 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Nominee · Emerging Chef · Rashida Holmes
2. Eater The Best New Restaurants in America
3. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Chef · Rashida Holmes

Chifa is the word for the Chinese-Peruvian culinary collision that took root in Lima generations ago, and this Eagle Rock restaurant leans into the mashup with zebra-print walls and zero apology. The menu pulls from family recipes and runs short on purpose, so each dish earns its place. The Michelin Guide awarded it a Bib Gourmand, which tracks for a room where the food punches well above the price.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Hidden behind Sugarfish in Beverly Hills, this jewel-box omakase counter operates as its own thing entirely, with no connection to the chain out front. The chef, a traditionalist who still finds room for surprises, runs a tight sequence of nigiri, sashimi, and handrolls built around exceptional seafood. It holds a Michelin star, and the room seats few enough that you're watching every cut happen in front of you.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

1. The New York Times The Restaurant List
2. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants
3. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America