‘Beef’
On my way to see In the Heights (I’m cultured!) at LA’s Pantages Theater, I had no time to eat any food. I also had no idea what kind of food even existed on that part of town. The Hollywood Strip is quite the foreign territory for me. After parking at a failed meter (score), I whipped out my Urban Spoon to see what it would show me. After sifting through a couple of dead ends, I found Dos Burritos and walked in to see what it could offer me.
Recently, a Facebook burger competition (very scientific) crowned 26 Beach in Venice as the best burger in LA. Now you may be asking yourself, “What the hell is 26 Beach?” and you are not alone, because even I had no idea what the place was until contest began. Somehow this unknown burger contender topped my personal favorite, Umami Burger. I couldn’t let this stand, well at least not without trying it myself, so off I went to 26 Beach to see what sort of witchery pushed their burger to the top of the heap.
For a little post-tennis victory Japanese treat, I headed to Asahi Ramen in West LA with my vanquished tennis foe to get some…ummm ramen. Now don’t be fooled by the name of the restaurant, as it apparently has nothing to do with delicious Asahi beer. Confused myself, I took the liberty of looking up Asahi on the old interwebs and found that Asahi is the name of about ten different towns and cities in Japan, so for the name to carry over into both beer and ramen isn’t that surprising. Anyway, enough with geography and economics, let’s get to the food.
In my experience, most taco trucks aren’t worth blogging about. It’s not that I feel like I am too good for them or that they aren’t interesting, but in most cases I have found that they all taste pretty much the same. This is not true of Tacos El Gallito. I stopped by here one night with no plans to blog, but just hoping to get a decent taco. Instead, I had one of my most legendary LA nights and wound up befriending a couple of their Mexican patrons named Toast and Reuben. I also fell in love with the truck and vowed to return to give them a proper unvegan review.
EDIT: Blimpy Burger has moved due to a rent dispute, but it is reputedly as good as always.
After four years of living in Ann Arbor and countless other trips to the city of my alma mater, I have finally made my way to Krazy Jim’s Blimpy Burger. Although I always knew of the place while I lived there, I didn’t realize just how big of a deal it was until I saw it on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. Since that time, it has been my goal to eat at Blimpy Burger and I can finally cross that place off of my list. But is it any good?
Recently, I was invited out to dinner with my girlfriend’s friend’s parents. Strange connection? Yes? Free meal? Affirmative. You know I wasn’t going to turn this one down. I found out we were going to a place called Sublime in Culver City and this surprised me. No, not because I haven’t heard anyone mention Sublime in 15 years, but because I had never heard of the place even though it was practically in my backyard.
For her birthday, my roommate decided she wanted to turn one year older in a big, gay fashion. And what gayer place to go than to Hamburger Mary’s in West Hollywood? Unfortunately her day of birth didn’t fall on a Wednesday night for Drag Queen Bingo, so instead we settled for their Tuesday night all-you-can-eat Latino heat tacos. The prospect of unlimited tacos for eight bucks sounded great to me, but the place was called Hamburger Mary’s and I felt as though I needed some sort of burger.
I couldn’t really figure out whether Mexicali Cocina Cantina in Studio City was named after the city of Mexicali or because it is a blend of Mexican and Californian food. Whichever it was, I was pretty impressed with the creative creations on their menu. It seemed that nearly everything on their menu had undergone some sort of upgrade from 87 octane to at least 89. Rather than just beef burritos, they had Kobe Beef Burritos. Rather than just fish tacos, they had Ahi Tuna Tacos. Everywhere I looked on the menu, there was something that seemed inspiring, at least in name.
In my attempt to consume some of the meatier delights from Jonathan Gold’s 99 Things to Eat Before You Die in LA, I convinced some of my coworkers to join me on a trip to Chili John’s in Burbank. In addition to reading about it on the list, I had heard a lot of other great things about the place, so I was surprised to find it pretty empty for lunch on a Friday. We all found a seat at the horseshoe-shaped counter and began our journey into chili.
I think we can all agree that there are not enough places in the world that offer unlimited food. And the places that do are usually pretty bogged down by endless salad bars and other assorted vegetables. Manna Korean BBQ in Culver City is not one of those places. Instead of concentrating on veggies, they have decided to concentrate on meats. For only 16.99, you get all you can eat meats. And these aren’t just generic grade D meats, these are a collection of short rib, brisket, pork belly, pork, chicken, spicy chicken and beef.