The Top 100 Places to Eat Near The Serving Spoon

1. James Beard Awards 2026 · Winner · America's Classics: California

1. Wine Enthusiast Forward 50 Restaurants

1. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
2. Los Angeles Times #29 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles
3. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Nominee · Outstanding Restaurateur · Greg Dulan
2. Time Out #25 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now
3. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurateur · Greg Dulan

1. Eater The 38 Essential 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

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

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

The patio at this Culver City contemporary French restaurant seats as many as the dining room, which tells you something about how the place pictures itself. Dinner is when the kitchen finds its stride, moving through chicken liver mousse in a delicate tart, clean fish preparations, and proper desserts. The wine list leans hard into by-the-glass options, which the room seems to appreciate.

1. Wine Enthusiast Forward 50 Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

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. Los Angeles Times #42 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles
2. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker · Nicole Rucker
3. James Beard Awards 2025 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker · Nicole Rucker

The red-orange cushions and pale green backsplash look like someone decorated with the produce order, which makes sense for a neighborhood restaurant that works directly with local farms. Tomat does all-day, but evenings are when the kitchen gets serious about California's seasonal haul. Dishes are meant for the table to share, and the room fills accordingly. The Michelin Guide has it selected, and Esquire put it on its best new restaurants list for 2025.

1. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Los Angeles Times #82 · 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

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. Time Out The best bakeries in America

Hand-pressed tortillas cooked on a comal over live fire are the opening act at this casual Mexican counter inside Maydan Market. The tlayuda is the main event: a hearty, meal-worthy situation loaded with beans, cheese, cabbage, and salsa, built to share if you add one of the proteins. The moronga is the one to get. Order at the counter, find a seat, and arrive with an appetite.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

An eight-seat counter where the seafood flies in from Japan several times a week and the Santa Monica farmers market fills in the rest. This is omakase at its quietest: minimal room, soft-spoken service, no flourishes competing with the fish. The knifework on a piece of squid nigiri is the kind of thing you notice without knowing why. A Michelin star, and a spot on the New York Times Restaurant List.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. The New York Times The Restaurant List
3. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America

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. Los Angeles Times #80 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Nominee · Outstanding Restaurateur · Greg Dulan

1. Esquire Restaurant of the Year
2. The New York Times The Restaurant List
3. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California

A family Thai restaurant on the Westside where the chef took over from her parents and didn't soften a thing. The menu runs from papaya salad with a real kick to green curry made from fresh chili paste, and the kitchen will calibrate the heat if you ask nicely. The pastries are a quiet surprise, French technique folded into Thai flavors. The Thai tea flan alone justifies staying for dessert.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Jordan Kahn's daytime cafe in the architecturally eccentric Hayden Tract looks like a place that takes itself very seriously, and then the food shows up and you realize it has earned the silence. The interior is stripped to near nothing, which focuses you entirely on plates that are genuinely intricate without announcing it. A morning or lunch stop, but not a casual one.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times #14 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

The barrel-vaulted ceiling and windowless room give Lielle the feeling of a place that doesn't need to be found easily. It's a tasting menu restaurant on Pico, holding a Michelin star, where chef Marcus Jernmark runs Californian cooking through a precise European sensibility without tipping into fussiness. Scoring a reservation takes some effort, and the room, once you're in it, is intimate enough to make that feel deliberate.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

The chef at this tiny omakase counter in Culver City handles everything, drinks included, which is either a red flag or a flex depending on your prior omakase experience. It's the latter. A handful of seats, two seatings a night, and a nigiri-forward menu where most pieces arrive simply dressed with nikiri and wasabi. Snag a reservation before someone else does, because they go fast.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Brick floors, creeping vines, and a crowd that seems to have been cast by a Venice Beach location scout. This Abbot Kinney institution is a Mediterranean restaurant built around wood-fired pizzas and shared plates, with vegetables doing serious heavy lifting on the menu. It's spawned a bakery, a to-go counter, and a cookbook, which is a lot of offspring for one room. A Michelin Selected spot that's also on the all-time Eater 38.

1. Eater The All-Time Eater 38
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Shrimp arrive head-on, sautéed in a red sauce of roasted chilies and beer, and that one dish tells you everything about this Nayarit-style seafood spot in Inglewood. The enclosed back patio is where locals settle in for whole fried fish, heaping ceviches, and tacos that landed on the Los Angeles Times' best taco list. The Michelin Guide has noticed too. Order broadly and let the kitchen, a family operation through and through, do the talking.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times Tacos de marlin · The 101 Best Tacos in Los Angeles

Ice cream mid-savory-course is either a provocation or a mistake, and at Dave Beran's Seline it's very much the former. This is a high-concept California tasting menu built around themes like the arc of the seasons, where a miniature garden of edible succulents arrives before lamb with burnt strawberry jus. Beran holds a James Beard Award for Best Chef: California, and the room earns the attention it gets.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. James Beard Awards 2026 · Winner · Best Chef: California · Dave Beran
3. Los Angeles Times #13 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

A Michelin-starred counter tucked into the second floor of a Sawtelle strip mall, which tells you something about Los Angeles. Chef Hayato Kojima runs an intimate omakase for a handful of diners at once, no printed menu, no fixed courses, just whatever he sourced that morning explained warmly by staff who bridge the language gap. Everyone eats together, so arrive on time or the whole table waits.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

A courtyard anchored by a large tree strung with twinkling lights sets the mood at this West Adams pasta-forward Italian restaurant. Chef Avner Levi started as a pop-up, and the laidback ease of that origin stuck. Pasta is the point, housemade and taken seriously, though the lamb ossobuco braised with mole earns its place on the menu too. The crowd tends toward neighborhood date-night, which the setting handles without trying too hard.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The pergola-shaded patio alone explains why this Culver West neighborhood restaurant fills up fast. Inside, tufted leather banquettes and an L-shaped bar give it the feel of a Southern roadhouse that got a little lucky with real estate. The menu leans into biscuits, pork, and seasonal vegetables with genuine conviction, and the vegetable section is substantial enough to build a whole meal around without anyone feeling cheated.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The chicharron, crispy pork belly in garlic mojo, is the dish that people apparently plan their week around. This is a Mexican restaurant from chef Ray Garcia, running a compact menu of bold, nostalgic cooking that skews contemporary without making a show of it. The room fills fast, so reservations are not optional. Start with the aguachile negro and work your way forward; skipping anything tends to feel like a mistake in hindsight.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
2. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: California · Alfonso “Poncho” Martinez

1. Eater Chef of the Year · José Olmedo Carles Rojas
2. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles
3. Los Angeles Times #52 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Sunset Inspired Italian · Where to Eat and Drink

1. Time Out #17 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now
2. Los Angeles Times Al pastor taco · The 101 Best Tacos in Los Angeles

1. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California

An Ethiopian restaurant sitting quietly in the Little Ethiopia stretch of Fairfax, where injera-lined silver platters arrive on the table and a fork is beside the point. The family-run team keeps the room simple and lets the food argue for itself, which it does. The kitfo draws regulars back, and the Michelin Guide gave it a Bib Gourmand. Come with a group large enough to order widely, or you'll spend the meal regretting what you skipped.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Los Angeles Times #86 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles

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

A satin-smooth wood counter on the second floor of the Two Rodeo Drive galleria, where Rodeo Drive's foot traffic floats by below and Derek Wilcox runs a quiet, focused omakase above it. The American-born chef trained extensively in Japan, and that comes through: cuttlefish from Kagoshima, needlefish from Miyagi, bluefin lightly smoked over rice straw. The nigiri is the reason to stay attentive. Miura holds a Michelin star.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

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

Wolfgang Puck's steakhouse inside the Four Seasons on Wilshire is the kind of room where the banquette seating and the beef grades arrive with equal seriousness. Cuts run from American prime to Australian Wagyu to Japanese A5, and the price of your entrée will make this feel like a consequential evening regardless of what's being celebrated. The crowd tends to be well-dressed and on somebody's expense account.

1. AAA Four Diamonds
2. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended
3. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A California-meets-French bistro in Mar Vista where the open kitchen puts every plate in plain sight and the room fills fast enough that weekend reservations are less a suggestion than a survival strategy. The menu moves between sautéed foraged chanterelles and duck with dates and saffron, with a prix fixe if you'd rather hand over the decisions. The wine list leans French and the lime tart has its own following.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

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

1. AAA Four Diamonds
2. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

A glass wall full of marina boats sets the scene at this upscale Marina del Rey seafood restaurant, where the spirit is old-school Continental with a heavy hand on the flourishes. Caviar shows up regularly, the tableside shrimp Louie is sized for the table, and nobody seems to mind. The room leans into the celebration, and the cocktail menu asks you to pick your Jane, Jetson, Goodall, or Austen.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Time Out The best Chinese restaurants in America

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. AAA Four Diamonds
2. Time Out #38 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

The website is ilovemole.com, which tells you everything about what this Oaxacan restaurant is here to do. The orange façade announces it from blocks away, and inside, the grill station fills the room with the smell of blistering peppers before you've even sat down. The moles, particularly the negro and rojo, are the reason regulars keep coming back. Complimentary chips arrive already drizzled with mole coloradito, so you're committed before you've ordered.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Time Out #39 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

Dave Beran's Santa Monica bistro leans hard into France with no apologies and no asterisks. Wood beams, exposed brick, and white kitchen tile set the scene, and the pressed duck for two is the kind of centerpiece that makes the table next to you lean over and ask what you ordered. The marble bar handles a more casual drop-in just fine, with Champagne and caviar if you're feeling it. A New York Times pick for the city's best.

1. James Beard Awards 2025 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurant
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now

The draw at this Koreatown restaurant is a whole duck roasted in a clay pot, stuffed with chestnuts, sweet potato, rice, and herbs, and it requires a day's notice, which is either a dealbreaker or the first sign you're dealing with something serious. The bird arrives bronzed and carved tableside. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, it's the kind of place that rewards anyone willing to plan ahead and bring a group to share the thing properly.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

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. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

1. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
3. Los Angeles Times #66 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

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. Sprudgie Awards 2023 · Finalist · Best New Cafe

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. Time Out #2 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

Nearly everything on the menu at this upscale-casual steakhouse passes over live fire, from ribeyes and Berkshire pork chops to roasted carrots and tagliatelle. Josiah Citrin keeps the room feeling more Venice backyard than white-tablecloth, with concrete walls and beige booths absorbing the noise of a crowd that tends to linger at the bar well past happy hour. The Michelin Guide has it on their list.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Chef · Jeremy Fox
2. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now
3. Time Out #22 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Sunset Inspired Italian · Where to Eat and Drink

1. Wine Enthusiast Forward 50 Restaurants

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

1. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles
2. Los Angeles Times #72 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

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

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

Wood smoke from the rotisserie drifts a block down Western before you even see the place, which is as good an advertisement as any. This Koreatown Peruvian spot has been an old-school institution for decades, turning out whole chickens over live fire with a crispy, marinated skin that keeps the family recipe firmly in-house. The twice-fried fries and the spicy green aji sauce are not optional. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand, and the wait will remind you why.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

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

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

Two counters share the space, divided by a sliding wood partition, but regulars know which side to book. This is an omakase counter in Santa Monica where the chef's experience goes deep, the blonde wood counter runs minimalist and calm, and the nigiri speaks for itself. Prices match the ambition without apology. Reservations at the smaller counter fill fast, which tells you something without requiring anyone to say it.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

You enter through a discreet side door, which sets the tone for Josiah Citrin's long-running Santa Monica tasting menu. Inside, the room feels like a velvet underground with good silverware, and the French decadence runs toward the gratuitous side, which is the point. Tableside saucing, antique silver press, dry-aged duck, truffles on everything. Two Michelin stars.

1. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
2. Los Angeles Times #23 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles

1. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Best New Cafe

1. Los Angeles Times The 101 Best Restaurants in California

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

1. Sprudgie Awards 2025 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

Servers in traditional garments, each one quietly wired with an earpiece, set the tone at this upscale Korean barbecue institution on Olympic. The menu leans into the classics, short ribs and galbi done with evident kitchen seriousness, and the banchan spread alone warrants the trip across town. Tables fill with large groups feeding the grill, and the waits run long, so treat the room as the whole evening rather than a stop along the way.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Order at the wood counter, catch a glimpse of the kitchen behind it, and try not to eat the pastries before your food arrives. Liu's Cafe is a small, low-key Chinese diner on 6th Street where the seats fill fast and the menu leans into comfort: wontons, braised pork belly rice, chili oil noodles, a pot of milk oolong on the side. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand, and the sesame cold noodles won a LAist Best Bites nod.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. LAist Sesame cold noodles · Best Bites

1. Sprudgie Awards 2025 · Finalist · Best New Cafe

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

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

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

1. Time Out #9 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

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

A pasta bar in Koreatown where the menu reads like a thought experiment: what if Italy and Korea had sorted things out earlier? Husband-and-wife chefs run a tight, dimly lit room with bar seating wrapping the space, the kind of setup that makes a solo dinner feel intentional rather than sad. The Korean-Italian mash-ups go all the way through to dessert, so order broadly and let the table sort out the overlaps.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

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

1. Los Angeles Times #56 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles
2. Los Angeles Times Fifty Under $50

1. The Infatuation Our Favorite Bakeries In The Country Right Now
2. Eater Best New Bakery
3. Eater The 38 Essential Restaurants in Los Angeles

Citrin sits in the same building as the tasting-menu-only Mélisse, but it offers a more flexible format, with prix-fixe and à la carte alongside each other. The kitchen runs on French technique and California produce, classical at the bone but with modern, global instincts. Caviar and truffle upgrades are available for the inclined, though the cooking holds its own without them. It holds a Michelin star.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

The chicken liver mousse comes with olive jam, which tells you exactly what kind of brasserie this is. Lumière sits inside the Fairmont Century Plaza and runs a classic French playbook: fruits de mer, steak frites, a charcuterie spread with aged Iberico hams, crème brûlée done properly. The staff actually know the menu and will talk you through it, which in Los Angeles passes for a minor miracle.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The screaming-red dining room telegraphs the mission before you've ordered: this is a ramen shop built around tan tan noodles, a cross between Japanese tantanmen and Sichuan dan dan. A sister to Tsujita down the street, it runs a spice scale up to six, and the pitchers of water at every table are not decorative. Bowls come soupy or dry, and both hit hard on peanut, garlic, and chili oil.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Dark masa quesadillas filled with Oaxacan cheese, in-house tortillas, and tacos served all day set the tone at this modern Oaxacan spot a short walk from the Venice beach scene. The room looks the part, all bright and California-casual, and the mezcal list gives you something to do while you decide between the barbacoa and the tinga de pollo. The Los Angeles Times put it on its Fifty Under $50 list, which tracks.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times Fifty Under $50

The name comes from a Māori word, and the New Zealand Wagyu arrives wood-fired, which tells you something about the seriousness of the sourcing before you even sit down. This is a Beverly Hills steakhouse with exposed brick, brass fixtures, and an open kitchen, but the vibe runs warmer and more romantic than the category usually suggests. Wagyu here lands at prices that don't require a quiet moment with your bank app afterward.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

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1. Sprudgie Awards 2024 · Finalist · Notable Roaster

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.

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The counter seats maybe a dozen people, the room is barely wider than a hallway, and it runs noon until late without a break. Petit Trois is a French bistro in Hollywood doing the classics straight: escargots, steak frites, a legendary omelet. French hip-hop plays while the kitchen ignores it completely and turns out textbook bistro cooking. The "Big Mec," a double cheeseburger finished with bordelaise, is the one concession to the neighborhood.

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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.

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