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.

When I arrived I found out that they were not a one-burger place. 26 Beach had a bunch of good-looking burgers (ranging from 14 to 19 smackeroos). The burger that had actually won the competition was one of those 19-dollar burgers. It was called the Chef Katsu’s Original California Roll Burger. That’s quite a name and quite a burger unfit for this unvegan. This Angus burger is topped with snow crab salad, avocado, ginger, nori, shoyu-wasabi-aioli, baby mixed greens and tomato. First off, I don’t love me some sushi, so eating sushi on a burger would be no good for my taste buds. Second off, that is just too many toppings. Sure, I love me some bacon and egg on a burger here and there, but those are flat and manageable, not some unholy menagerie of beef and sushi.

Quickly dismissing this burger, I moved on to greener pastures. It was truly difficult to choose from their great options, but I finally settled on their Prosciutto Burger. This 19-dollar monster was topped with prosciutto di parma, triple creme cheese, fig compote, baby mix, heirloom tomatoes and mayo. I ordered mine without the fancy baby mix and heirloom tomatoes. It came with a side of fries to make me feel a little better about dropping nearly 20 bucks on one burger.

After a bit of a wait, all of our burgers arrived. I glanced at those who ordered the “Best Burger in LA” and knew I had made the right choice. These burgers weren’t some amateur little fast food burgers. These were massive beef patties that almost made me forget the small fortune I had dropped on mine. I dug in a met with a nice variety of flavors. The bun was fluffy and buttery and the burger itself was cooked perfectly with a nice, thick grind. The cheese was gooey and tasty, but when combined with the prosciutto it kind of overwhelmed my taste buds with salt.

Something was needed to cut through the salt, something was missing. Oh yes, the fig compote. After a few bites, I found where the fig compote was hiding and this brought a great balance to the burger. Unfortunately, the compote wasn’t spread throughout the burger and with each bite, I hoped that there would be fig involved to bring balance to my mouth. Sadly, it wasn’t always there.

The Prosciutto Burger at 26 Beach was definitely a great burger. Unfortunately, lack of balance kept it from being one of the best burgers I have ever had. I’m definitely up for another visit to 26 Beach to try some of their other interesting burgers, but their prices are probably going to keep me away for some time.

EDIT: This Souplantation is no more, but if you’re into salad bars there are plenty others carrying on its name.

As a man who loves all-you-can-eat, I was very excited at the prospect of heading to Souplantation (also known as Sweet Tomatoes in some places). I knew that they had an 80-foot salad bar, which sounded terrible, but I had also been told they had some REAL food. When I walked in, I hadn’t totally comprehended what an 80-foot salad bar would look like, and it bothered me deeply. Tucked in the recesses of this foul bar, I found some pastas that seemed pretty decent. I decided to start with these and took them back to my table for some tasting.

Unfortunately, these pastas were not at all as good as they looked. All of them were cold, which rendered them mostly tasteless. I don’t really understand why people eat cold pastas and enjoy them, but they are certainly not my thing. Since these were the only unvegan options at the salad bar, I boycotted all 80 feet of it and tried to find something good. What I found was some Mac and Cheese. This mac and cheese was in dire need of some salt, but salt would have been to simple for an unvegan. Instead, I found some bacon bits and sprinkled them upon the mac. This add a nice smoky and meaty flavor to the mac in addition to the saltiness.

After my mac, I thought I should check out some of the namesakes of Souplantation, no, not the plantations…the soups. These weren’t the most exciting soups, but the chili looked like it could fit my unvegan needs. I topped this with cheese and since I couldn’t find anything crunchy like Fritos, I added some bacon to the top of this too. And that bacon was quite necessary. I know that a lot of chili has tomato in it, but in this, the tomatoes were nearly impossible to avoid while digging for beef. The bacon gave me some more meat to play around with, but it wasn’t enough to save the halfway decent chili.

But I wasn’t done yet, this was a buffet after all. Following the chili, I found something else to drop cheese and bacon bits into. A baked potato! There isn’t much to say about this except that it tasted like a potato and the cheese and bacon added that good old fashioned cheesy and bacony flavor. This was a pretty tiny tater, which was actually nice because it left more room in my stomach for some other carbs. These were the pizza and breadsticks. The pizza was a basic cheese and was mostly dough with a little bit of sauce and cheese. Now supposedly there were two types of breadsticks, one a cheesy garlic and another a four cheeser. I couldn’t tell any difference, but whichever one I got did have a strong cheesy flavor that was much appreciated.

After a few rounds of that pizza, which was arguably the best thing there, I finally moved onto dessert. They had some pastries, jell-o and other typical buffet food, but I opted for some soft serve ice cream and a muffin. The cones for the soft serve were the smallest I’d ever seen, and really limited the amount of ice cream you could get. I guess I could have grabbed a bowl instead, but I like my ice cream from a cone, the old-fashioned way. The muffin was pretty good and although slightly dry, could have been a lot worse. Plus, it was blueberry, my favorite.

So to sum it all up, if you like salad, you will love Souplantation. Maybe they should call it Saladplantation? The non-salad food was pretty limited and none of it was especially stellar. It was nice to be able to mix and match by using bacon and cheese, but a good chili and mac and cheese would have been seasoned enough to start, without needing my help. Hey, if I wanted to cook, I would have, but I came to eat and found there was a bit too much of a struggle to find enough food to fill my stomach right.

Heading into Beechwood, I was feeling a bit skeptical. Bars in Venice can tend to be a bit trendy, especially the food-serving kind. Once inside, part of my skepticism was confirmed, with strangely shaped lounge seats and a half hour wait even though we had reservations. Oh well, at least they had a pretty sweet beer menu so I could have a little something to drink while waiting. They had a pretty cool-looking wheat beer called Moosbacher from Germany. Since I like moose and wheat, I figured these would outweigh my distaste for Germany, and I was right. It was quite good and came in a huge bottle.

About midway through my beer we were seated. I took a look at the menu and was surprised by the high prices. Since when did bar food become so pricey? Luckily, we were able to order from the special bar menu and I found something that looked great, at least in name. It was called the Amusing Ground Rib Eye Burger and hey, I like to be amused. It came with BBQ sauce, gruyere and arugula. The arugula did not amuse me so I ordered it without and then got it cooked medium. It was nice that even though this was a semi-pretentious place, they were willing to take changes, unlike some gastropubs I know (achem Father’s Office achem)

It arrived and looked pretty swanky. The bun had some sort of swirly design on it that gave it character and was nice and soft. I chomped down and was really impressed. You may even say I was amused. The burger was nice and moist without being juicy and drippy and the house made BBQ sauce went really nicely with it. It was also nice that it came with fries, unlike some gastropubs I know (achem Father’s Office achem).

Overall, I was pretty satisfied. The place in general was a bit expensive and pretentious, but they made up for that with some good beers and quite a good burger. It may never get the acclaim that other gastropubs do, but the Amusing Ground Rib Eye Burger definitely deserves to be up there.

Not to be confused with C & O Trattoria, C & O Cucina is just down the street in Marina Del Rey. Although the location is completely different, the menu seems to be the same as the other C & O. One thing it is missing, though, is the fun outdoor atmosphere. Nonetheless, I had a restaurant.com gift certificate so I had to try it out.

The best part about this C & O, just like the other one, is the garlic knots. The arrive as soon as you sit down and don’t stop flowing until you leave the place. This is definitely not the place to go with someone who doesn’t eat garlic. While snacking on the garlic knots, I looked at the menu long enough to decide I wanted the Rosemary Chicken Ravioli. This came with a creamy tomato sauce.

I snacked on more garlic knots while waiting for my main course and then it arrived. Just as can always be expected at C & O, the ravioli was delicious. The creamy tomato sauce was great, while there was just the right amount of ravioli to stuff me. The chicken stuffed inside was also delicious. Although the atmosphere isn’t as fun as the C & O Trattoria, C & O Cucina is a nice, reliable place to get some Italian food. Oh and those awesome garlic knots.

Once Little Caesars abandoned their “Pizza Pizza” slogan, they seemed to fall off the face of the earth. A few years later, though, they were reborn with the $5 Hot-N-Ready large pizza. The idea behind this is that pizza has become too complicated. Choosing a topping can be a pain in the ass, then finding the right coupon to go along with your purchase can be even more difficult. With the Hot-N-Ready pizza, you can walk right into as Little Caesars at any time, throw down five bucks and walk out with either a large cheese or large pepperoni. It’s a genius idea, because who really wants a different topping on their pizza? But it only works if the product still tastes good. I recently paid a visit back to Little Caesars to see if their Hot-N-Ready was just like I remembered.

The only Little Caesars I really know of in LA is in the stretch of Centinela that falls between Mar Vista and Marina Del Rey, but really doesn’t have a name for itself. I walked into the place and asked for a large pepperoni, which they gladly pulled out of a heating device and handed to me. I hoped that the pizza hadn’t been there for long and a forked over my five bucks and change for sales tax purposes.

I took the box home and opened it up to begin eating. It looked like any normal delivery pizza would. Pepperoni covered it in just enough places and it didn’t looked like it had been hanging out in the heating box for too long. I took a bite and was quite content with what I tasted. There were no special ingredients and really nothing special about the pizza at all, except for how easy and cheap it was to get. There are plenty of better pizzas in the world, but a reliable $5 pizza is difficult to find outside of Little Caesars.

Tucked away in an unassuming strip mall in Marina del Rey is Antica Pizzeria. Based on it’s location, you wouldn’t expect too much out of it, but it happens to have quite the reputation. It apparently uses some good old fashioned dough straight from Naples.

I scoured the menu for a while, having trouble finding a good pizza without vegetables. In the end, despite their reputation, I ordered the calzone instead of the pizza. I figured this was okay because it still has all the dough of a pizza, just better ingredients. The calzone here came with ricotta, mozzarella, salami and basil.

When it came, it was just massive. After noticing the size, I quickly noticed the bright green leaf laying upon the top of my calzone. Anger began to well up within me, but I was quickly told that it was the basil. Antica Pizzera really dodged a bullet there, I have enough to worry about without thinking there are vegetables snuck into my meal.

I started eating my calzone, and it was pretty amazing. The dough was perfect, and there were plenty of ingredients inside to keep a healthy balance with the dough. I would definitely go back, but it would be nice if they had a nice, meaty pizza to offer.

In a world crumbling under the pressure of mounting recession and potential depression, deals can be found aplenty. Well, that is assuming you still have enough money to eat. When I went to Rubio’s in Marina Del Rey, they were offering up a little recession combo that I decided to take advantage of. This was two street tacos, chips, beans and a 20 oz. drink for only $5.

The choice of taco innards was up to me, so I got one with steak and one with chicken. They came with guacamole and an unfortunate mix of onions and cilantro. I would have liked the cilantro, but it was all or nothing and I couldn’t risk having onions on my tacos.

The street tacos were similar to what one might get from a taco truck. No frills and served just the way that I would expect to find tacos in Mexico.

Rubio’s also has a delicious little salsa bar, which is always a delightful opportunity for me to try to make a super salsa. On this particular day, my super salsa attempt was the salsa verde with a dash of chipotle pepper salsa. A good mix, to be sure, but still not the best I can do. Salsa perfection is a difficult process and I fear I will never achieve it.

Despite the relative cheapness of my meal, I feel like I could have gotten more food for the price that I paid. Maybe another taco? Or even rice? One more little treat would have greatly aided me in my personal recession…

Italian food is often a difficult food to spend a lot of money on. It is hard to justify dropping $15 on a meal when I can easily boil pasta, microwave some Classico sauce and sprinkle some parmesan on top. C & O Trattoria, however, is a place that exceeds anything I could provide in my own kitchen.

The ambience itself makes you feel like you really walked into a restaurant in Italy, with outdoor seating, a fountain and strings of lights. Even the walls are painted to make it feel like you are sitting out on the street rather than inside a restaurant. I took my seat and started looking at the menu when the waiter began bringing out my unlimited garlic knots. The waiter could hardly bring them out fast enough for me to eat them.

From the massive menu, I finally chose the Rigatoni Tomato Cream, which is made with tomato-cream sauce, sweet basil, garlic and extra virgin olive oil. For added happiness, I had them throw in some grilled chicken. Despite filling up on garlic knots, when my meal came I was able to fully enjoy it. Everything was cooked to perfection and I can even attest to the Rigatoni Sausage, which I tasted from a friend’s plate. As for the portion, I was splitting it with a friend, but otherwise I would have had plenty to take home for a second delicious meal.

Another great thing about C & O is that if you show up on the right day at the right time, they will bust out into a rousing rendition of “That’s Amore.” It can’t hurt to have a few glasses of wine before singing.